The Maybot and the Highlander clash as Tory hounds bay for Blackford blood in heated exchange

IT was the afternoon after the night before and it turned out to be one of the more acrimonious Commons clashes between the Maybot and the Highlander.

The context was the hangover from the Brexit party on Tuesday evening when a “flabbergasted” SNP leader lashed out at the Conservative Government for having successfully pushed the move through Parliament to try to scrap the Irish backstop.

To uproar from the Tory benches, Ian Blackford declared: “The Conservative Party has effectively ripped apart the Good Friday Agreement.

“This House should be ashamed of itself.”

Among those honourable members incensed by the SNP Westminster chief’s accusation was the DUP’S Nigel Dodds, who jumped up to denounce the Nationalist’s “utterly reckless” remarks.

David Mundell, the Scottish Secretary, later went on the telly to accuse Mr B of “contemptible” behaviour, saying using Northern Ireland in this way was “just another tool in the SNP’S armoury” of securing a second independence referendum.

At PMQS, after the usual Brexit ding-dong between the PM and the chief comrade, the Highlander rose to a rumble of leftover Conservative discontent from the night before to ask what were the “alternative arrangements” to the backstop the Maybot was proposing.

Theresa May explained something had to change given the historic 230-majority rejection of her original plan but she was also keen to comment

on the SNP chief’s reference to the Good Friday Agreement, which she declared was “frankly irresponsible”.

The Highlander rose to insist, faced with a wall of Conservative noise, that the only thing irresponsible was Mrs M’s actions. His SNP chums were gesticulating to the Speaker about the level of baying from the Tory benches.

John Bercow jumped up to intervene. “Attempts to shout him down are not just rude, they are irresponsible and undemocratic… Stop it!

“It is low grade, it is useless and it will not work,” declared the Speaker.

Mr B attempted to continue, accusing the PM of making a “graceless response” and claiming: “What she demonstrated in that answer was, ‘Here are my principles. If you don’t like them, you can have some more’.”

He tried to continue as the Conservative berserkers’ wall of sound intensified.

The Speaker again jumped up to snap: “Stop it!

“Chanting in the background is utterly irresponsible.”

The Highlander continued to make sure he got his soundbite in: “Does the Prime Minister accept that she promised Scotland everything but delivered nothing?”

To Tory cheers, the PM hit back, boasting: “Scotland is part of the United Kingdom.”

She noted that figures just out showed over 60 per cent of Scotland’s exports went to the rest of the UK, which was more than three times than those to the EU. So there.

Raising SNP hackles, the Maybot had the last word, noting that

Mr B represented a party that wanted to erect a border between Scotland and England.

“The biggest threat to the future of Scotland,” snapped the PM to a mixture of Tory cheers and Nationalist jeers, “is sitting on the SNP benches.”