Arguments

The media and the independence debate: newspapers, broadcasters and the limits of criticism

Arguments · Published 2026-11-04

Arguments about the media have run alongside the constitutional debate since 2014. Many supporters of independence believe that newspapers and broadcasters were biased against them; many journalists, in turn, have described sustained online abuse from a minority of activists. In May 2018 a newspaper column about hostility towards pro-independence journalists reopened the discussion. This article sets out the facts about the Scottish media landscape and the rules that govern it.

A press that mostly backed No

During the 2014 referendum, the Sunday Herald was the only established newspaper in Scotland to declare support for independence, which it did in May 2014. All other national and Scottish daily titles either backed No or took no formal side. Supporters of independence, who won 45% of the vote, therefore had very little representation on newspaper editorial pages, although individual columnists and magazines such as Bella Caledonia and websites such as Wings over Scotland gave voice to their views online.

The imbalance had a commercial background. Newspaper circulation in Scotland, as elsewhere, had been falling for years, and many titles were owned by companies based outside Scotland. After the referendum, Newsquest, the owner of the Herald titles, launched The National on 24 November 2014 as a daily newspaper supporting independence, initially as a trial. It became permanent and was later joined by a Sunday edition.

Broadcasters and impartiality

Broadcasters are in a different position. Under the Ofcom Broadcasting Code and the BBC's own editorial guidelines, they must maintain due impartiality on matters of political controversy, and during the referendum period they were required to give balanced coverage to both campaigns. Complaints of bias were nonetheless frequent. In September 2014 an exchange between the BBC's political editor, Nick Robinson, and First Minister Alex Salmond led to a protest outside BBC Scotland's headquarters at Pacific Quay in Glasgow. Academic studies of the coverage reached different conclusions: some found an imbalance in the framing of economic stories, while others found that coverage was broadly balanced in airtime.

BBC Scotland launched a dedicated television channel in February 2019, partly in response to long-standing complaints that Scottish news was squeezed into UK-wide schedules.

The 2018 debate about criticism

In May 2018 a column in the Sunday Herald criticised what it described as a fringe of the independence movement that attacked journalists, including journalists who were sympathetic to independence. The column prompted a lively discussion among supporters of independence. Some agreed that personal attacks and threats were wrong and self-defeating; others argued that media criticism was justified given the imbalance of the press. Many took a middle position: that challenging editorial stances, demanding more investigative reporting and pointing out errors was healthy, but that abuse and threats were never acceptable and damaged the cause of those who engaged in them.

The Sunday Herald itself closed in September 2018, replaced by the Herald on Sunday and the Sunday National.

Where criticism ends and abuse begins

The distinction between legitimate criticism and abuse is not only a matter of manners; it also has legal and institutional dimensions.

Organisations representing journalists, including the National Union of Journalists, have repeatedly raised the issue of online abuse, which affects journalists of every political leaning and is often directed in particular at women.

Lessons from elsewhere

Comparisons with Catalonia were frequent in 2017 and 2018. There, the pro-independence movement had built a dense network of local organisations that campaigned face to face in towns and neighbourhoods, and it had substantial support from Catalan public broadcasting and part of the press. In Scotland, the movement's reliance on social media made it more visible online, but also more exposed to the impression that its most aggressive voices spoke for all of it. Both cases suggest that a movement's relationship with journalists is part of its public image.

Why it matters

Democratic debates depend on voters having access to accurate information and a range of views. In Scotland the decline of local newspapers, the growth of partisan online outlets and the polarisation of social media have changed how people receive political news. Supporters and opponents of independence share an interest in a media system that reports the debate fairly and in a culture where journalists can work without intimidation.

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