IT’S been a good couple of weeks for polling on Scottish independence.
Just a month after polling commissioned by The National found most Scots would vote for independence, a new poll this week showed that a majority wanted another independence referendum within the next 10 years.
It comes as Scotland’s independence movement finds itself increasingly aligned with fellow UK nations pushing for constitutional change.
The leaders of the so-called “Celtic Alliance” attracted rare mainstream media attention for their causes after joining forces to sign a self-determination declaration calling on Westminster to “prepare for, plan and facilitate constitutional change”.
With increased attention on the constitutional movements in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, The National has taken a closer look at more than a decade of polling to examine how support has changed – and what the age of those backing constitutional change might tell us about its future.
Scotland
Starting at home, support for Scottish independence has waxed and waned since the 2014 referendum without either side establishing a sustained and overwhelming lead.
To make the longer-term trend clearer, The National averaged all the independence polling in for each year rather than comparing hundreds of individual polls.
The years immediately following the referendum saw support for independence fall, with the annual Yes average dropping from 46.8% in 2014 to 41.3% in 2017.
That began to change in the years following the Brexit referendum, with Yes averaging 47.6% in 2020 compared with 42.4% for No – the largest Yes advantage in the period covered by our analysis.
Scotland overwhelmingly voted to remain in the European Union in 2016, but left after the UK as a whole voted for Brexit. This was particularly significant given that uncertainty over Scotland’s continued EU membership had been one of the key arguments deployed against independence during the 2014 referendum campaign.
The post-Brexit gap subsequently narrowed before reversing back towards a substantial No majority. Yes averaged 43.6% in 2023 against 47.3% for No, before recovering to 44.8% in 2024 and 46.2% in 2025.
So far in 2026, the polls included in our analysis have averaged 45.8% Yes and 44.9% No.
Over the past 12 years since the independence referendum, Scotland has remained closely divided, with independence support capable of moving several points over relatively short periods, often reacting to shocks such as Brexit or Covid.
Wales
The picture in Wales is markedly different.
Support for Welsh independence remains substantially below the levels recorded in Scotland, but the polling suggests it has increased from where it stood a decade ago.
The polls included in our analysis averaged just 14.5% support for independence in 2014, against 72% opposed.
By 2019, average support had risen to 20.8%, before reaching 24% in 2020 and 27% in 2021.
There are considerably fewer Welsh polls than Scottish ones in our dataset, meaning individual surveys can have a much greater impact on the annual averages.
The single standard poll included for 2025 put support at 35% against 50% opposed, while the polls included so far in 2026 average 26% Yes and 52.5% No.
Rhun ap Iorwerth has now become Wales’s first Plaid Cymru first minister, marking a historic moment for the party, but support for its ultimate goal of Welsh independence remains a minority position.
But the overall trend is towards growing support for separation from the UK.
Despite the relatively low figures, support for Welsh independence sits at a broadly similar level to the support for Scottish independence when the 2014 referendum was announced – suggesting talks of a possible Welsh independence vote may not be as premature as they seem.
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland presents a different constitutional question again, with polling asking voters about the prospect of Irish unity rather than independence.
A Spotlight poll in January 2013 found 17% backing a united Ireland and 65% opposed.
Our annual polling averages show support at 22% in 2016, rising to 32.2% in 2018 and 39% in 2019.
Since then the figures have fluctuated, with average support sitting between roughly one-third and two-fifths in each year covered by the data.
In 2025, the polls included in our analysis averaged 38.5% support against 46.5% opposition. The 2026 polling included so far puts those figures at 35.8% and 49.7%, respectively.
Taken together, the three sets of data show constitutional movements at very different stages: Scotland remains closely divided, support for Welsh independence is substantially lower despite having grown from its levels a decade ago, while polling on Irish unity in Northern Ireland has also trended towards support for unification since 2014.
Despite the differences in the respective countries’ polling figures – one factor unites all three: age.
The generation divide
Recent polling broken down by age shows younger Scots are considerably more likely to support independence than older generations.
Among 16 to 24-year-olds in the Scottish polling analysed by The National, 59.1% backed independence compared with 17.5% opposed.
Support was even higher among those aged 25 to 34, at 64.3%, and remained at 58.8% among 35 to 44-year-olds.
A majority of 45 to 54-year-olds – 50.5% – also backed Yes.
But the picture reverses sharply among the two oldest groups. Just 36.4% of those aged 55 to 64 backed independence compared with 54.5% opposed, while among those aged 65 and over Yes support fell to 28.9% against 64.3% for No.
And Scotland is not unique in having such an age divide.
The Welsh polling analysed shows 41% of 18 to 24-year-olds supporting independence, compared with 29% opposed.
Yes also led among those aged 25 to 34 and 35 to 44, although by considerably narrower margins.
Among 45 to 54-year-olds, however, support fell to 21%, against 51% opposed. Among those aged 65 and over, just 12% backed Welsh independence while 74% opposed it.
The same generational divide is visible in Northern Ireland, with support for Irish unity falling steadily among older age groups.
Some 44% of both 18 to 24-year-olds and 25 to 34-year-olds said they would vote for unity, compared with just 31% among both groups aged over 55.
Opposition moves in the opposite direction, rising from 35% among 18 to 24-year-olds to 53% among those aged 65 and over.
Taken together, all three countries show the same feature: younger respondents are more supportive of constitutional change than older respondents.
Will today's young Yes voters become tomorrow's No voters?
At first glance, the age divide might appear to have a straightforward implication.
If younger voters are more likely to support independence, then as older generations leave the electorate and younger generations replace them, the overall balance could gradually shift towards constitutional change.
But it’s not necessarily as straightforward as that.
An age gap at one moment in time cannot tell us whether people will hold the same political opinions throughout their lives.
There are two possible explanations. The first is an “age effect”: younger people may be more supportive of independence when they are young but become less so as they get older.
The alternative is a “cohort” or generational effect, where generations develop different political attitudes because of the circumstances and events they live through and retain those differences as they age.
Research from the Scottish Election Study suggests there is evidence for the latter in Scotland.
Researchers found “little systematic evidence” that younger voters have changed their minds on independence as they have grown older. Those born before 1965 have remained roughly two-to-one against independence, while those born after 1980 remain solidly in favour. Those in between are much more evenly divided.
If those generational differences persist, demographic change could lead to sustained majority support for independence in Scotland.
That does not, however, mean demographics can tell us the outcome of a future referendum.
Scottish Social Attitudes data shows that the size of the age divide itself has changed. Until 2016, there was only a modest difference in independence support between younger and older Scots.
That year, support reached 61% among under-35s compared with 36% among those aged 55 and over. By 2021, the gap had grown to 28 points.
Researchers linked the emergence of the divide in part to Brexit, with younger voters more likely to support remaining in the EU as attitudes towards Europe and independence became increasingly intertwined.
By 2024, however, the gap had narrowed to 13 points, with researchers suggesting some of the enthusiasm for independence among younger Scots may have abated.
I would suggest that another possible factor is the arrival of a generation with little or no memory of the 2014 referendum, who did not come of age when the constitutional question was so prominent in Scottish politics.
This highlights another problem with assuming demographic change will inevitably boost support for independence.
Today’s younger voters will grow older, but new generations will continually enter the electorate – and there is no guarantee they will share the views of the young people who came before them.
This suggests that for support for independence to remain high among future generations, the constitutional question needs to remain a prominent part of the national conversation, as it was in the years surrounding the 2014 referendum.
While there are obvious differences between each nation, what is striking is that across all three, the generations set to make up an increasing share of the electorate are currently more supportive of constitutional change than those they will gradually replace.
Whether they retain those views as they grow older – and whether the generations that follow them develop similar ones – remains to be seen.
But if those generational differences persist, the constitutional debate could look markedly different across Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland in the decades to come.
