2023 Scottish independence referendum



A referendum took place on Thursday, 13 April 2023 on Scottish independence from the United Kingdom. In a reversal from the results of the 2014 independence referendum, 57% of voters voted for Scotland to gain independence from the United Kingdom, largely due to the effects of Brexit. The country officially left the United Kingdom exactly two years later, on 13 April 2025.

Background
This referendum took place 8 ½ years after the 2014 independence referendum, in which Scottish voters voted to stay in the United Kingdom 55%-45%. However, after the UK as a whole narrowly voted to leave the EU while Scotland didn't, support for independence gradually grew. A second referendum had been discussed since 2014, with many Scottish politicians supporting it, and English politicians (such as Boris Johnson) opposing it. However, in 2022, the UK reluctantly allowed the referendum to go on, due to a "moral duty," as Prime Minister Robert Buckland put it.