FOXES

Are extending their territories in towns and cities while the roads have been quieter

Managing expectations is always important in politics and yet, despite all of our collective experience, politicians, the media and commentators are always woeful at doing so.

So it proved on Friday at Holyrood’s Salmond inquiry. We were ready for a Hollywood blockbuster. Instead, we got a 12-part documentary with the only saving grace being the breaks in between. There was always a chance of this. Alex Salmond is an experienced performer and retains an effective rhetorical flourish. We got to see that in his opening statement, which he was able to execute on his terms and in his tone. Thereafter, though, the turgid nature of a Holyrood committee meeting took hold, wearing down even the keenest observer by the end of its sixth hour. Though Salmond’s testimony will undoubtedly have been uncomfortable for Nicola Sturgeon and many of those around her, we learned nothing new. Sturgeon’s position is no more or less secure today than it was before Salmond sat down at 12.30pm on Friday.

This Wednesday, when Sturgeon appears before the inquiry, will likely leave a similar impression – lots of commentary, lots of media coverage and a Twitter explosion, but ultimately no fundamental change.

And here, we reach the nub of this issue. The political impact of the Salmond inquiry was never, in my view, going to be a short-term one. Because of the interminable weakness of the opposition, the fallout is not going to keep Sturgeon out of Bute House after May’s election, and may not even prevent the majority the SNP needs to make a second independence referendum more likely. However, this is not to downplay its longer-term impact. This is devolution’s biggest event – a significant crisis in government and parliament, and in the SNP. The reputational damage to Holyrood can be reversed, in time, but the damage to the SNP and the unity of the independence movement may never be.

So, whilst polls show clearly that the SNP will have another strong election this year, the emerging chasm in the party already places a question mark over its ability to win a fifth term in 2026. And while more than 20 polls in a row have recorded a Yes lead in the independence race, a fracturing of that already unstable alliance – particularly one which promotes a less positive and conciliatory tone towards our southern neighbours – may bode ill when the second referendum actually arrives.