Voters in Scotland would vote for independence from the United Kingdom, a new poll has suggested.
The survey by Michael Ashcroft for Holyrood magazine is the first since March 2017 showing support among Scots for breaking up the union, according to POLITICO.
Of the 1,019 voters polled, 46 percent said they would vote for independence and 43 percent said they would vote against. When those who said they did not know or would not vote are excluded, the result swings to 52 percent versus 48 percent in favour of secession.
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The results serve a major boost to Scottish First Minister and Scottish National Party leader Nicola Sturgeon, but are a blow for Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who visited Scotland last week, and Scottish Conservatives leader Ruth Davidson.
Sturgeon hailed the "phenomenal" poll, adding: "A broken Westminster system means Scotland is being dragged towards a no deal Brexit, regardless of the heavy price we'll pay for lost jobs and lower living standards."
"That project is being led by Boris Johnson – a prime minister Scotland didn't elect and who has no mandate to tear Scotland out of Europe with all the damage that will entail."
She added: "It would be a democratic outrage for any Tory government to deny that, and this poll shows such an anti-democratic position is completely unsustainable."
Scotland voted overwhelmingly to stay in the EU at the 2016 referendum on Brexit, while a POLITICO-Hanbury poll last month found Johnson is toxic among Scottish voters.
Ashcroft, a former Conservative Party chairman who did not support Johnson for the leadership, said on the Conservative Home website: "In the wake of [Prime Minister] Boris Johnson's visit to Edinburgh last week I polled Scots to measure support for a second independence referendum and to gauge opinion on independence itself."
He added: "I found a small majority in favor of a new vote – and the first lead for an independent Scotland for more than two years."
