John Swinney preferred by SNP voters, but wider public more likely to say Kate Forbes would be best First Minister

New Scotland polling, conducted from 29th-30th April following Humza Yousaf’s resignation, finds that:

• SNP voters are most likely to favour John Swinney as a potential successor to Humza Yousaf as First Minister. 
• When the public are asked who would make the best First Minister out of a list of possible SNP candidates, Kate Forbes has a six-point lead over John Swinney – but 2021 SNP voters are again more likely to prefer Swinney.
• Three in five SNP voters say Yousaf’s decision to end the Bute House Agreement with the Scottish Greens was the wrong decision. SNP voters are more likely to say this was the wrong decision than the Scottish public overall are (60% vs. 45%).
• Two in five of the public (39%) say a Labour-led Scottish Government would do a better job than an SNP-led Scottish Government, while 27% say it would do a worse job.

Views on Humza Yousaf’s time in office

The public are split on whether Yousaf was right to end the SNP’s formal cooperation agreement with the Scottish Greens – 45% think this was the right decision, while 45% say that it was the wrong decision. 

• 2021 SNP voters are more likely to say Yousaf’s decision to end the Bute House Agreement was the wrong decision (60%). 
• Younger people are also more likely to think this was the wrong decision (60% wrong decision, 23% right decision among 16-34 year olds).In contrast, older people were more likely to say it was the right decision (65% right decision, 31% wrong decision among those aged 55 and over).

A clear majority (81%) of the public say it was the right decision for Humza Yousaf to resign, while 10% say this was the wrong decision. 

Reflecting on Yousaf’s time in office as First Minister, half of the public (51%) say he has made no difference to Scotland, while just 8% say that he has changed Scotland for the better and 37% that he has changed it for the worse. 

• SNP voters are even more likely than the wider public to say that Yousaf has made no difference to Scotland, with 60% of 2021 SNP voters saying this is the case, compared with 15% who say he’s changed Scotland for the better and 24% who say he’s changed Scotland for the worse.

There is no consensus among the public as to the impact Yousaf’s resignation might be expected to have on the SNP. Although over a third (36%) expect Yousaf’s resignation to have a negative impact on the party, a similar proportion (37%) say it will make no difference and 21% expect it to have a positive impact. 

Half of the public (50%) say Yousaf’s resignation will make no difference to the case for independence, while 11% expect it to have a positive impact and 33% a negative impact. In contrast, in Ipsos polling taken the day after Nicola Sturgeon resigned in February 2023, over half of the public (54%) expected her resignation would have a negative impact on the case for Scottish independence.

Potential contenders for Scottish First Minister

At the time Ipsos fielded this poll, the candidate/s for SNP leader and next First Minister were as yet unconfirmed. However, when the public are asked how a list of possible contenders might perform as First Minister, John Swinney and Kate Forbes are neck and neck for the top spot.

• 37% think Swinney would do a good job, compared with 23% who say he’d do a bad job. 
• Similarly, 37% believe Forbes would do a good job as First Minister, against 24% who think she’d do a bad job. 

Swinney is rated more highly than Forbes among the SNP’s own voters, however. 

• 58% of 2021 SNP voters believe John Swinney would do a good job as First Minister, while just 10% say he’d do a bad job. 
• They are more divided on Kate Forbes – while 46% say she would do a good job as First Minister, 22% say she’d do a bad job. 

However, when asked who would make the best First Minister out of a list of possible SNP contenders, Forbes has a six-point lead over Swinney – 26% of the public say she would make the best First Minister, while 20% say Swinney would be best. But SNP voters are again more likely to prefer Swinney, with 30% saying he would make the best First Minister, compared with 21% who say the same of Kate Forbes and 14% who think Stephen Flynn would be the best First Minister.

Public awareness of the remaining potential SNP candidates asked about the poll, some of whom had already ruled themselves out of the race at the time of writing, is lower than for Swinney and Forbes. Half of the public don’t know who Neil Gray, Màiri McAllan or Jenny Gilruth are (51%, 50% and 50% respectively), while a third don’t know who Stephen Flynn (36%), Angus Robertson (36%) or Shona Robison (34%) are.

Meanwhile, opinion is split on Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar. He is not quite as highly rated by the public as potential First Minister as either Swinney or Forbes, with 31% saying he would do a good job (vs. 37% for both Swinney and Forbes) and 27% saying he would do a bad job as First Minister. Public opinion on Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross is more clear-cut, with over half (52%) saying he would do a bad job, compared with 16% who think he would do a good job. 

Would Labour or the Conservatives do a better job than the SNP in government?

Two in five (39%) of the public say a Labour-led Scottish Government would do a better job than an SNP-led Scottish Government, outweighing the 27% who say it would do a worse job. A similar proportion (28%) say it would make no difference. 

• Older voters are more likely to agree that a Labour-led Scottish Government would do a better job - 48% of those aged 55+ say this, compared with 30% of 16-34 year-olds and 35% of those aged 35-54.   

Meanwhile, over half (55%) of the public say a Conservative-led Scottish Government would do a worse job than an SNP-led Scottish Government, with 24% saying it would do a better job and 16% that it would make no difference.

Emily Gray, Managing Director of Ipsos in Scotland, commented: 

These new results taken after Humza Yousaf’s resignation indicate that John Swinney would be a more popular choice among SNP voters to replace him as First Minister than Kate Forbes would be. However, Forbes has a 6-point lead over Swinney when it comes to who the wider public think would make the best First Minister. The SNP will be looking to select a leader who can unite the party, secure cooperation from opposition parties so that laws and budgets can be passed and reverse the party’s slide in the polls. While Swinney may be better placed than Forbes to address the first two of those, on the third point the evidence suggests that Forbes may currently have wider appeal among the electorate than Swinney does.

Technical note

• This data has been collected by Ipsos’s UK KnowledgePanel, a random probability panel which provides gold standard insights into the UK population, by providing bigger samples sizes via the most rigorous research methods.
• Ipsos interviewed a representative sample of 1,127 adults aged 16+ in Scotland. Interviews were conducted online on 29th and 30th April 2024.
• Data are weighted to match the profile of the population. All polls are subject to a wide range of potential sources of error.