The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
SNP’s big Brexit problems
You wonder if the speech writer who had Nicola Sturgeon say she would “reset” Indyref2 knew the law – to reset is to sell stolen goods. Not the best connotation to bring to mind. It has another meaning associated with technology. To reset is a grand word for switching off and switching on again.
Which is perhaps a more accurate association for Indyref2.
Holyrood seemed in no mood to dwell on the fudge of delaying a referendum timetable while still keeping a referendum alive, giving the FM an easy time on her statement.
Ruth Davidson was focused on keeping her smile fixed after the blow to the head from the Prime Minister’s dumb deal with the DUP took the shine off recent Scottish Tory success.
Not on track
It falls to the media to ask if the First Minister is getting back on track – and the answer is no.
Sturgeon was forced to reflect on Indyref2 after the general election result when voters punished the SNP for endlessly talking about referendum timing without giving any policy detail.
It was like discussing the date for a birthday before you have got pregnant – a nonsensical reversal of the natural order.
Sturgeon admitted as much in her Holyrood statement this week.
She said: “So the challenge for all of us who believe that Scotland should be independent is to get on with the hard work of making and winning that case.”
This column has long argued the old Indyref2 strategy was duff, and the independence case can only be won on the details.
Not that the SNP respond to criticism. As demonstrated, they would rather lose seats than face.
For a FM who likes to talk of the responsibilities of office, humility is not one of them.
She said banging on about Indyref2 is over, for now, and in its place she will bang on about Brexit.
It’s a bad strategy for various reasons.
The first is simply this: The sound of Nicola complaining is like fingernails on a blackboard to many.
A softer tone and more positive message would go a long way to restoring her appeal.
The next point is she lost votes from people who didn’t want Indyref2 and also from those who wanted Brexit.
The shift in the north-east is more complex than simple boredom with independence.
Thus for the SNP to aim for soft Brexit or no Brexit does nothing to win back old supporters.
Sturgeon has discovered Brexit nationalists are willing to switch.
Why Brexit?
So why bang on about Brexit? She does so partly because the leadership is convinced it is meant to discuss “big things” – they are a devolved administration which has become fixated on UK issues.
Sturgeon can legitimately say Brexit has been forced on to the agenda by others, Scots are not keen and the Scottish Government have a duty of sorts to speak for the country.
Defining that duty is hard. Scots returned 35 MPs, half of those on offer for Scotland, and that can be taken as a mandate to resist Brexit.
On the other hand, it is a Westminster matter and as leader of Holyrood, she has other fish to fry.
How much does Sturgeon focusing on Brexit look like a duty, and how much like dodging domestic issues?
My hunch is there is too much of the latter to excuse the former. She looks like she isn’t doing the day job.
Worse, she will become too associated with the general mess of a political class which is incapable of arranging the most basic things.
This is the vanity fair voters have come to hate.
Banging on about Brexit makes her look like another shouty politician – a Farage-like single issue figure.
The obvious reason why Scottish nationalists should not shout about Brexit is because it is a story about what happens when nationalists don’t prepare for the consequences of their populism. Brexit is the mirror image of Scotland’s independence from the UK.
SNP’s contradictions
In pursuing the matter, the Scottish Government reveals its own contradictions – things which are apparently beyond the Scottish Government in connection with independence are suddenly within its gift when it comes to Brexit.
So we are given a much more thoughtful paper on Scotland in Europe than the White paper on independence, and we are given longterm economic projection for Scotland outwith the EU, but none for Scotland out of the UK.
After the General Election it looks like trade unions, businesses and politicians are gathering around the idea of soft Brexit. The nats will struggle to look like the dominant force in creating this shift.
However, it will be easy for opponents to suggest they are milking every Brexit knock back as a grievance for independence.
It will feed a growing impression the SNP want a bad Brexit in order to provoke Indyref2.
I don’t think Sturgeon does want a bad Brexit, but as she is never going to admit a good one would take independence off the table, she is in a fix.
The nats would be far better letting the Brexit bourach damage everyone else while focusing on domestic matters.
And in place she will bang on about Brexit