By a Newsnet reporter
As First Minister Alex Salmond hit the campaign trail in Inverurie to kick off the final week of European election campaigning, two new opinion polls confirmed that the contest for Scotland’s sixth seat is between the SNP’s Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh and Nigel Farage’s UKIP.
A Survation poll in today’s Daily Record put support for the SNP in the European election at 37% once don’t knows are excluded, compared to 26% for Labour, 13% for the Conservatives, 10% for UKIP, 6% for the LibDems and 6% for the Greens.
The survey result suggests the contest for Scotland’s sixth seat is between the SNP and UKIP, with the SNP ahead.
Meanwhile an ICM poll in the Scotsman found similar results, with the SNP on 36%, Labour on 27%, the Conservatives on 13%, UKIP on 9% and the LibDems and Greens both on 7% – giving further confirmation that the choice is between the SNP’s Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh and UKIP.
This week SNP activists are expected to take the message to voters that only a vote for the SNP will let Scotland make our mark in Europe and ensure that UKIP’s anti-devolution, anti-immigrant agenda gains no traction in Scotland.
Commenting SNP Leader and First Minister Alex Salmond MSP said:
“As this campaign enters its final stages, today’s polls confirm that in Scotland voters are faced with a straight choice between Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh and Nigel Farage’s UKIP for Scotland’s sixth seat.
“The intolerant message that UKIP is peddling has no place in Scotland. And the way to keep UKIP’s agenda out of Scottish politics is by voting SNP.”
As the campaign enters its final days, a Panelbase poll carried out on behalf of the Sunday Times showed more Scots said UKIP made them think of the word ‘racist’ above any other. Nigel Farage’s party have been criticised for running what many critics have claimed is a campaign based on intolerance.
The UKIP leader was today forced to issue an apology after comments he made on a live radio interview, in which he implied Romanian immigrants were criminals and most people would not want them as neighbours, sparked fury.
Highlighting the need to challenge the UKIP agenda, Mr Salmond highlighted the credentials of the SNP candidate, Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh (pictured).
He added: “In our candidate Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh, we have the antithesis of everything UKIP stand for. She represents the choice in this election between the new Scotland we want to build and the miserable, anti-European agenda of UKIP and the Westminster parties.
“Where UKIP would undo the progress we have achieved in Scotland by abolishing free personal care, bringing back tuition fees, charging for prescriptions and privatising the NHS, we want to work with our European partners to deliver more progress for people in Scotland.
“A vote for the SNP on Thursday is a vote for a tolerant, welcoming Scotland that rejects the deeply unpleasant politics of Nigel Farage’s UKIP.”