A TORY peer left the Question Time panel bemused as he tried to crunch the numbers from the 2014 independence referendum and 2016 Brexit vote.
On last night’s Question Time, Alex Salmond responded to a question about how confident his Alba Party were that they could win over new voters.
Salmond said they were “not relying on the SNP to make progress” as he reaffirmed the party’s belief to help Scotland achieve independence.
In response to this, Tory peer Malcolm Offord said he felt he was in a “bit of Groundhog Day” because “we did this in 2014”.
He then started to crunch the numbers and said: “Let me remind you of the score. First of all 3.6 million Scots voted, 84% turnout, the highest turnout in any election in the G20 except Australia where it’s compulsory to vote.
“Two million Scots voted to stay in the UK. 1.6 million voted to leave. It was decisive. It was decisive.”
However, things got a bit confusing when Offord started to compare these results to the EU vote.
In Scotland, just under 1.7 million voters said they wanted to remain in the EU while just more than one million said they wanted to leave.
Offord continued: “In the Brexit vote, one million Scots less voted, 2.6 million Scots voted in the EU referendum, one million less than the UK so that tells you that to the Scots that one million more people cared about the UK than the EU.
“And in the EU vote 1.6 million Scots voted to stay in the UK which is topped by two million to stay in the UK.”
Salmond in particular was left looking bemused as Bruce told Offord he was starting to “lose his audience”.
The former first minister added: “Zillions of people vote one way, zillions of people vote the other way but democracy is not a once and for all thing.
“People are entitled when circumstances change if they want to change their mind. And they’re certainly entitled when they vote for it to get the democratic opportunity to vote for independence.”
