BELIEVE IT OR NOT, THE TORIES COULD GRAB SCOTTISH SEATS

This will be the Brexit general election – everywhere apart from scotland, that is. North of the border, the campaign will largely be fought over a second referendum on breaking up the UK.

The result will answer the two questions on which the survival of the Union depends: are the fortunes of Nicola sturgeon and the SNP truly on the wane at long last, and can the Lazaruslike revival of Ruth Davidson’s scottish Conservatives be sustained?

For Miss sturgeon and her fellow separatists, the timing of Theresa May’s announcement is both good and bad.

Good, in that the First Minister can go to voters asking for a direct mandate to hold another referendum and, if she secures a majority of scotland’s Westminster seats, will be able to claim democratic legitimacy for such a step. Bad, because the polls show most scots do not actually want a second vote – at least, not yet – and because the high-water mark of the Snp’s recent electoral success has probably passed.

At the 2015 general election, the Nationalists won an unprecedented 56 of the 59 seats at Westminster. The scottish Labour Party – for decades the dominant political force – and which produced such significant national figures as Gordon Brown, Alistair Darling and John Reid, was humiliatingly reduced to a single seat, with the Tories and Lib Dems also securing one apiece.

One year later, the SNP romped home in the 2016 devolved election, securing its third consecutive spell in government in Edinburgh. in local elections taking place on May 4, the party is expected to perform well again, and to take control of Glasgow, a long-time Labour heartland. And on June 8, the party is expected to retain most of its Westminster seats.

Over more than a decade, sturgeon and her predecessor Alex salmond have used all the tools high office provides in a bid to prise the UK apart, and have packed scotland’s institutions with SNP supporters to cement their power base for the long-term. however, the cracks are starting to show.

Miss sturgeon’s devolved administration has drawn fire for its anaemic performance, having failed to get to grips with the continuing decline in scotland’s schools, to tackle shaming health statistics, or deliver appreciable improvements in public services. increasingly, opponents argue the SNP’s independence obsession gets in the way of good day-to-day governance.

Certainly, Miss sturgeon saw the Brexit referendum result as a chance to further weaken the bonds binding the UK together. While 52 per cent of all British voters chose to leave the EU, 62 per cent of scots voted to remain. The First Minister claimed this and the ‘significant and material change’ Brexit would mean to the UK’s constitution, justified the re-running of the 2014 independence referendum.

it may have been a strategic miscalculation – polls have subsequently shown that half of voters are opposed to another vote so soon, with only a third in favour.

Nevertheless, Miss sturgeon will fight this election, arguing that only independence can save scotland from a ‘hard Tory Brexit’. But she will not have it all her own way.

she is not the only popular female politician in scotland. Ruth Davidson has led the scottish Conservatives back from the wilderness to the point where they are now the official opposition at holyrood.

her detoxification of the party’s brand north of the Border remains a work in progress, but it is a remarkable achievement in a nation where ‘Tory’ has largely been used as a term of abuse. The collapse of Labour under Jeremy Corbyn at a UK level has been mirrored at holyrood, allowing the charismatic Miss Davidson to fashion her party into the most effective and credible vehicle for anti-SNP votes. in a recent poll, scots awarded Theresa May an approval rating six points higher than the one they gave Nicola sturgeon – and they rated Miss Davidson five points above Mrs May. Now Miss Davidson has a chance to demonstrate that the Conservatives’ tartan resurgence is real and sustained, and to further enhance her reputation as the only scottish politician capable of standing up to the separatists.

The Tories will hope to capitalise on this momentum and take a handful of seats from the SNP. Constituencies in the Borders, Perthshire and the North East – the areas with the highest proportion of scottish Brexit supporters – will all be targets.

While it is almost certain Nicola sturgeon will emerge the winner on June 8 – it is also likely we will see fresh evidence of the SNP’s electoral decline and the scottish Conservatives’ revival. And while Miss sturgeon may indeed find herself with the mandate to call another independence referendum, the truth is most scots don’t want one and, as of now, she would be likely to lose. Ruth vs Nicola: place your bets.