Better Together canvassing twice as many voters as Yes campaign

The Yes campaign contacted over 100,000 potential voters last week but that figure has been dwarfed by stats the No camp are claiming.

Yes Scotland was in touch with more than 70,000 Scots in the last seven days, while the SNP campaign contacted 37,000.

Better Together has refused to publish its numbers but a senior campaign source has claimed through both telephone canvassing and door-knocking they contacted more than 200,000 people last week.

Pro-independence strategists last night poured scorn on these figures and pointed to “substantial evidence” of “default Noes” described as people who previously said they were voting No but hadn’t given their vote serious thought moving to Yes.

It’s understood the canvass returns on the pro-independence side are showing bigger support for independence than the traditional polls but Yes bosses are keeping a tight lid on these findings.

Pressed on this issue by The Sunday Post, SNP Deputy Leader Nicola Sturgeon said the Yes canvassing results “broadly mirror” the traditional polls, which have shown a tightening in recent weeks.

But hinting at what the canvassing is showing, she added: “I think things are moving pretty rapidly, we may already see things running ahead of the polls.”

She added: “The most striking thing I’ve picked up is people who have been No, sometimes as they have just not engaged with the issues, are now moving to Yes.”

No strategists accuse Yes of overplaying its ground war offensive and point to the strength of the individual party campaigns, with Labour contacting more than 32,000 people last week and the Lib Dems speaking to “tens of thousands” of people.