I may be an idiot, but I don’t like being treated like one.
I like people to give me the benefit of the doubt, to imagine that – just maybe – I can grasp simple concepts.
And, so, my hackles have been up in recent days, listening to First Minister Humza Yousaf as he insists Labour and the Conservatives are, to all intents and purposes, one and the same party.
The SNP leader wants us to believe something that’s patently not true. He wants us to reject the evidence of our eyes and ears.
“This week,” Yousaf tweeted, “I accused Labour of being a pale imitation of the Tories. I was wrong, they are a replica.”
What’s worse than the nonsense of this claim is that even Yousaf doesn’t believe it. After all, he has previously told us that – after the next general election – he’d be in the market for some kind of deal to support a minority Labour government in order to keep the Tories out of power.
Why would he do that if Labour and the Conservatives were indistinguishable from each other?
Naturally, the SNP’s most unthinking supporters will happily parrot this nonsense about Tory and Labour politicians being interchangeable, but even some of Yousaf’s colleagues aren’t so sure it’s wise.
The MP Stewart McDonald argued that, although the SNP should critique Labour, after the “disaster years” of Boris Johnson and the catastrophic premiership of Liz Truss, telling people Labour and the Conservatives are the same won’t get his party very far.
McDonald is right, of course. The SNP will only advance if it can add to its existing support. A decade of angrily denouncing Labour as Tory copyists has failed to do that. There is a limit to the success of that sort of thing, and it was reached in 2014.
The FM is trying to keep the core support on board
The SNP is, understandably, twitchy about the improvement in the Labour Party’s fortunes across the UK. The prospect of Sir Keir Starmer in Downing Street significantly undermines the nationalist argument that only a vote for them can keep the Tories out of government.
In fact, if anyone genuinely wants to keep the Tories out of power, a vote for Labour is the way to go about it.
Yousaf – and other senior party figures – have conceded that a second referendum on independence is a long way away
Yousaf – and other senior party figures – have conceded that a second referendum on independence is a long way away. This being so, the message of recent elections – vote SNP for indyref2 – is dead in the water.
In lieu of that, the first minister needs something to keep the core support on board. I guess that’s what he’s playing at with his current nonsense.
The SNP’s most loyal backers may lap up this garbage about Labour and the Tories being the same. But Humza Yousaf needs a more credible message if he’s to increase support for his cause.
Euan McColm is a regular columnist for various Scottish newspapers
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