Dear Sir Ian,
I’m writing on the subject of statistics used by the Scottish Government, the SNP, and the “Yes” campaign, which is at least partially run by the SNP.
As you will of course know, the SNP Scottish Government are putting a great deal of resource into pushing for the break-up of the United Kingdom. This has included the dissemination of many statistics, many from the Scottish Government’s own studies and many from external sources.
However, there have been repeated occurrences of the SNP, and their campaigns, deliberately mis-using these statistics when communicating to the Scottish people.
As an example, on multiple occasions the SNP and their associated campaigns have repeated the line that 97.4% (or “almost 100%”) of Scotland’s energy demands are generated by renewables.
This is being spread by literature delivered door-to-door by the Yes campaign, and in November 2021 First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said:
“Just short of 100% of all the electricity we use is from renewable sources.”
As has been pointed out by fact-checking websites such as full-fact, it is clearly not the case that Scotland’s energy needs are met at this level from renewables. There is deliberate misconstruction of two separate statistics, the total amount of energy generated, and the energy demands from Scotland.
Given the importance of giving the public a fair and correct view of official statistics, I was wondering what you could do to ensure that mis-use of statistics is called out.
Thank you for reading and I hope to hear from you.
Yours sincerely,
Stephen Kerr MSP