Labour bringing down the ‘Tartan Wall’ will not only redraw the political map, but potentially change the way it governs

Despite a tumultuous few weeks that have exposed ruptures in the wider Labour movement over events in Israel and Palestine, Labour’s poll lead remains remarkably untouched. At an average of 18 points ahead, it seems that the desire for change amongst the public is hard to shake.

One nation where it has taken time to set in, however, is Scotland. Originally a battleground that spelt the demise of Ed Miliband’s premiership, it now looks as though the winds are finally changing. With the collapse of the SNP’s reputation in the wake of successive scandals, and tactical voting by those who favour being part of the UK, it looks as though Labour has finally passed the governing party in the polls. A seismic new poll by YouGov shows Labour on 38% to the SNP’s 32%. The Conservatives are trailing on 16%.

We know this is unlikely to be an outlier; not only is there a general trend across all Scottish voting intention polls that have led to this moment, but Labour’s recent by-election success in Rutherglen suggests there are real world implications to these numbers. More than perhaps any other development in the last month, including even those seismic by-elections in England, it is the party’s changing fortunes in Scotland which signal Labour success at the next election. With a sweep of Scotland, the electoral maths of breaking down this ‘Tartan Wall’ makes it far easier for Labour to pave the way to Number 10.

But this is more than just forecasting electoral arithmetic - it could also forecast the way the party governs.?

The Red and Blue Walls in British psephology have dominated debate.The fascinating profiles of the voters in each of these has inspired whole books on the implications for the future of Britain. But whoever dominates in the Tartan Wall across the central belt of Scotland has huge consequences for any governing coalition.

Research suggests that Scottish attitudes, at least economically, lean leftward. A NatCen study in 2020 found that 44% of Scottish voters believed taxes are too low on high earners, compared to 36% in England. Even if attitudes are just marginal - the SNP’s awkward coalition owes itself as much to independence support than anything else - the perception matters. For the last near decade, the SNP have argued that voters should switch to them and punish the ‘Red Tories’ in Labour. Elsewhere, the areas where votes are most likely to switch are the major urban centres - Glasgow and Edinburgh - which share much of the same metropolitan, diverse outlooks as those of London, Manchester and Birmingham, where Labour already dominate.

Simply put, the more Scottish votes the Labour Party gains in SNP swing seats, the more of a perceptively progressive mandate it may hold.

Progressives could argue that to retain Scottish voters over the course of a government, reforms across devolution, infrastructure spending, childcare spending, education, and taxation should form a core part of their policy programme. This is not to say the Shadow Treasury team will abandon fiscal restraint with glee, but rather that any savvy reformists both on Labour benches and the wider movement now have an arsenal up their sleeve that they did not have before.

Labour’s success in Scotland not only increases the chance of a Labour government, it could change the governing coalition to an extent that also opens the party up to a more radical future than it once assumed. The Tartan Wall, it would seem, is a political phenomenon that could have far more consequence than current commentary suggests.