We must build our own future without crooks and chancers of Westminster

Well, this truly is a minter. Our elected government falling to bits like a biscuit in a tumble dryer. The world looking on as the self-styled randy ragamuffin Boris Johnson desperately denies himself in knots over the Downing Street Christmas party.

At the time of me starting this article, he hasnae resigned.

There’s necks of brass, then there’s whatever they smelt Tories from at Eton.

Trust in the political system comes down to accountability.

We have it here in the Scottish Parliamentary sphere. Former chief medical officer Catherine Calderwood was forced out when it transpired she had broken the lockdown rules she herself had helped set.

When the news broke, there was widespread outrage.

A close relative of mine, usually a person marked by tranquillity, was bilin. She emailed her MSP, and the Scottish Government directly, to demand a resignation.

And she – and we – were appeased. The rule breaker was publicly shamed and removed herself from the scene.

Alex Salmond, probably the most conspicuous and powerful political individual in the history of the new Scottish Parliament, was not above judgment.

For all that he seemed invulnerable during his tenure, the allegations around his sexual behaviour resulted in several investigations, a court case and a parliamentary inquiry, which left his reputation trashed.

Accountability. It’s vital. Sir Walter Scott kent it, even though in his age Scotland was without a parliament.

He had one of his characters say, in Heart Of Midlothian: “When we had a king, and a chancellor, and parliament-men o’ our ain, we could aye peeble them wi’ stanes when they werena gude bairns. But naebody’s nails can reach the length o’ Lunnon.”

And therein lies the problem. Where is that accountability at Westminster?

We can absolutely erect and tear down our own parliamentarians here. We’ve shown that repeatedly.

But wir stanes cannae be chucked hard enough tae ding wi any force on the walls of Westminster.

So what, then, do these Boris Christmas parties mean for Snp-voting Dundee, or the bonnie (if switheringly Tory) lands of Angus?

We’re already the maist pro-indy swatch of Scots in the land, as confirmed in

the first independence referendum in 2014. We’ve seen through these crooks for a long time, and it has informed our voting patterns.

In our most recent elections, in May, 60% of voters in the city backed independence candidates.

How can we meaningfully adjust our voting patterns to more firmly reject these chancers?

The truth is, we cannae. We are currently trapped in a broken Westminster system where the votes of the city of Dundee are meaningless.

This crisis of government in London, and our total inability to do anything democratic about it, has reignited in me the burning need for independence.

I hope it’s doing the same across the city. Let this flagrant abuse of power and influence down the road fix our minds more firmly on building our own futures.

Some have said the parties will make people disobey Covid rules. Fuel that sense that there’s “one rule for them, one rule for us”. But let’s be honest. Obedience of Covid rules around here has been pretty lax for a while.

Pubs in my neighbourhood had drunken lock-ins during lockdown. Plenty of folk stot about the shops wi nae masks.

Some families here met for festive gatherings, some met for the bells at Hogmanay. Parties went on, and I was invited.

Plenty folk have stuck to the rules, more or less.

Plenty others have charted their own course for the last year.

I’m unconvinced that some toffs and Tories battering in about the Courvoisier last Christmas will alter our micro decisions around rule observance in Coldside or Fintry.

What this crisis does do, though, is reiterate, underline, scream out in capital letters WE CANNAE HAUD THEM TAE ACCOUNT.

We do have some Conservative representatives here, whose role it is to manifest our political will.

What have they been saying in public, since this storm broke?

Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross has been uncharacteristically outspoken on Boris Johnson’s handling of the fallout, saying no one should continue in their post if they have misled parliament.

Most of his colleagues have been conspicuous by their silence this week, although a Conservative list MSP for our region, one Maurice Golden, picked Wednesday as a day to attack the Scottish National Party for rubbish recycling rates in Scotland.

Golden presumably was fine with Boris’ big Xmas bashes, so long as the wine bottles were properly separated into the correct bins the next morning.

So weak is the culture of accountability in Westminster, it seems, that it would be more than Tories’ jobs are worth to criticise their leader, even in this circumstance.

Scotland is doing better. We have a system that people have a degree of faith in.

Let the ceaseless corruption and connivance down the road inform your vote in the next referendum.

Let’s invest power in those near at hand, so we can pebble them wi stanes when they arnae gude bairns.

In a broken system, the votes of our city are meaningless

TEARFUL: Allegra Stratton announcing her resignation as an adviser to Boris Johnson in the fallout from the Tory Christmas party row.