THE SNP are predicted to win the next Holyrood election - but Anas Sarwar will be Scotland's next first minister, according to a new poll.

According to a new poll in The Sunday Times, the SNP would narrowly win the most seats in 2026 but would fail to secure sufficient support to form a government.

The Norstat Opinion poll for the newspaper is the first to be conducted since the General Election.

It also predicted that Alex Salmond would make a return to Holyrood with his Alba Party winning four seats.

(Image: PA)

The polling suggests that Nigel Farage’s (above) Reform Party would win eight MSPs.

According to analysis from John Curtice, the SNP would win 41 seats, one more than Labour who would win 40.

However, even with the support of pro-independence parties – 10 Greens and four Alba members – this would be insufficient for the SNP to secure a majority.

The newspaper reports that the likely scenario would see Sarwar replacing Swinney, with support from 18 Scottish Tories and eight Liberal Democrats.

Curtice did warn, however, that Scottish Labour’s electoral success “may well prove far from straightforward” because voters were more likely to vote for the SNP in Holyrood elections. He further added that the proportional voting system “makes it much more difficult for Labour to win seats on the scale it did last month”.

The pollster explained: “Fending off Labour’s challenge will require strong and effective leadership from the SNP.

“And while 23% of Scots believe John Swinney is doing a good job as first minister, 34% believe he is doing a bad job, a net score of -11, down four on his rating shortly before the election.

READ MORE: SNP 'mimicking Labour with cuts claims – but Scotland has options'

“This means he is trailing Sir Keir Starmer, who is now on -5, up from -11 before polling day.

“The challenge that still faces Swinney is whether he can make more of a success of his party’s leadership than he managed when he first led the party in the early years of devolution.”

The poll found 33% of the electorate still planned to vote SNP in their local constituency, compared with 30% for Labour.

The Tories meanwhile would only pick up 12% of the vote, while 9% said they would vote Reform.

Elsewhere, 8% said they would back the LibDems while 5% would back Green and other parties picking up 2%.

For the more proportional list vote, the SNP and Labour were tied on 28% with the Tories on 14%.

Reform again polled on 9%, with the Greens on 8% and the LibDems on 7%. Alba meanwhile were left with 5%.