http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-09-18...lance.html
Scotland Votes Against Independence in Referendum, BBC Projects
By Dara Doyle and Ian Wishart Sep 19, 2014 12:41 PM GMT+0800 67
Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg
An anti-independence Better Together campaigner holds a sheet of stickers reading "Vote No" during a demonstration in Edinburgh, U.K.
Photographer: Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg
Pro-independence "yes" campaign supporters wave Scottish flags during a demonstration at George square in Glasgow on Sept. 18, 2014.
Photographer: Andy Buchanan/AFP via Getty Images
Ballots are counted at the Emirates Sports Arena in Glasgow on Sept. 18, 2014, after the polls close in the... Read More
Photographer: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images
Yes supporters gather in George Square hours befor polling stations will close in the Scottish independence... Read More
Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg
An official counts ballot papers for the Scottish independence referendum at the Royal Highland Center in Edinburgh,... Read More
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Scotland rejected independence in a referendum, with the campaign to keep the country in the U.K. prevailing by a wider margin than predicted in the most recent polls, according to BBC projections.
With 26 of Scotland’s 32 local authorities declared, the Better Together camp backed by Prime Minister David Cameron and the main U.K. parties had garnered 54 percent of the vote, while the “yes” campaign led by Scottish National Party leader Alex Salmond had 46 percent.
“The evidence that the ‘no’ side is going to win is beginning to stack up,” said John Curtice, professor of politics at Strathclyde University. The result in Glasgow “adds further weight that the ‘no’ side has won the referendum and won it pretty comfortably,” he said.
The pound surged as counting continued of the last ballots cast across Scotland yesterday. After wins for the “no” side, support for independence in the cities of Dundee and Glasgow narrowed the overall gap. The final result is due over the next two hours from the central count in Edinburgh.
“It does look like we have secured a ‘no’ vote,” Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander, a Liberal Democrat and the most senior Scot in the U.K. government, told Sky News as the first results trickled in. “But a ‘no’ vote is also for change, it’s our responsibility to get on with that.”
The pound climbed to a two-year high against the euro and appreciated against all 31 of its major peers. The pound traded up 0.6 percent at $1.6492 at 5:30 a.m. London time.
Two Years
The referendum is the culmination of almost two years of competing arguments over the viability of an independent Scotland, its economic well-being, currency and international standing. With a record 97 percent of Scotland’s 4.3 million-strong electorate registered to vote, overall turnout was more than 80 percent is most regions.
“I am deeply disappointed like the thousands across the country who put their heart and soul into this campaign,” Nicola Sturgeon, the deputy first minister in Scotland’s devolved government, said on BBC Television. “Our country is never going to be the same after this campaign.”
By just before 1 a.m., the boisterous “yes” rally that had reverberated around Glasgow’s George Square was becoming more subdued. Among the thinning crowd, groups had begun to relax and settle in for a long night spread out on the grass. Around the block at the Apple Store on Buchanan St, people camped out for the new iPhone release.
In Edinburgh earlier, people chanted “Scotland, Scotland” as hundreds assembled outside the Scottish Parliament building after polling closed.
“This means a change to the old order; the union’s finished, people want to build something new,” said David Thomson, 39, from the Scottish capital, his face painted in the blue and white of Scotland’s flag, the Saltire. “Even if it’s a ‘no’ victory we’ve shown we want change and that’s going to happen.”