Political spats between the SNP and the Tories are par for the course

Liz Truss may be ignoring Nicola Sturgeon – but the truth is the Conservatives and the SNP both feed off each other, argues Sean O’Grady

First minister Nicola Sturgeon addresses delegates as she closes the SNP conference in Aberdeen (PA)

The surprising thing about Nicola Sturgeon declaring that “I despise the Tories” is that anyone would be surprised that she said it.

It is, after all, virtually part of the job description of the leader of the Scottish National Party. Sturgeon has always played on the more passionate wing of the political field, and her partisanship is infused with a pungent nationalism reminiscent, in its way, of a peaty single malt Scotch. It’s strong stuff and is usually served undiluted.

In fairness, Sturgeon did say “the Tories”, ie the political movement as whole, rather than “Tories”, which would be more of a personal attack on all their representatives, members and voters – who still account for about a fifth of the adult Scottish population. She was therefore more careful than she’s been accused of – but maybe not as cautious in language as her usual habit. The word “detest” is still an emotive term, and better suited to more extreme groups than even today’s Conservative Party.

But the Tories are also to blame for her intemperate tone, and Liz Truss in particular. Past Conservative leaders avoided attacking Sturgeon personally, and have usually observed the niceties. Boris Johnson was accused of referring to the first minister of Scotland as “that bloody wee Jimmy Krankie woman” during a Downing Street meeting back in 2020 but was polite in person. His frustration derived from Sturgeon’s attempts to carve out a role for herself at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow. That wrangle illustrated perfectly the uneasy relationship between the Scottish and the UK governments. Since the SNP emerged as the governing party at Holyrood in 2007, relations have been at best uneasy but rarely descended into childish name-calling and outbursts.

David Cameron, Theresa May and even Johnson were respectful enough to make their first official visits as prime minister to Bute House, though the latter often snubbed Sturgeon’s requests for talks and neglected the weak machinery of consultation with the devolved administrations. He usually gave such duties to Michael Gove, a Scot, who adopted a policy of neglect. Constitutional debates came and went, but Westminster would seldom engage. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the mutual resentment, the adoption of marginally different policies and the jockeying to grab news headlines were painful to observe.

Enter Liz Truss and her cheerful remark that Sturgeon is a mere “attention seeker” and best ignored. Sturgeon countered that Truss had asked how to get on the cover of Vogue. More substantively – and against the interests of Scotland and the UK – is Truss’s apparent refusal to even make a phone call to Sturgeon. This is no way to run a partnership of nations in the best traditions of the union.

There are three abiding truths that put these damaging squabbles into perspective. First is to remember that politics has always been a rough old game, which is why Winston Churchill in 1945 suggested that the Labour Party would need “some sort of Gestapo” to implement its programme; and why Nye Bevan called the Tory party “lower than vermin”.

Second is the stark truth that the Tories and the SNP feed off each other. The SNP prospers when the Tories are in power, and arrogantly English with it; the Tories use the SNP as a bogey to scare English voters with a “nightmare” Labour-SNP “coalition”. It is a symbiotic relationship, and the more rebarbative it is the better for both parties, perversely.

Third, the creeping realisation that the one positive outcome of Brexit (from a unionist point of view) is that it makes Scottish independence much less feasible than the last time independence was put to the Scottish people in 2014 – though not impossible (as Brexit proved).

It would not only be a matter of the usual fiscal questions – the pound, the carve-up of assets such as the BBC and National Grid and so on – but also how to run the new economic border between Scotland in the EU, and the rest of the UK, outside the EU (ie mostly the land border with England). Northern Ireland’s dual customs union and (partial) single market status was sometimes offered as a model; it no longer looks so attractive.

The realities of Brexit have appalled the SNP but also unsettled the party. With support for independence growing but not yet overwhelming, it has made the SNP impatient yet acutely conscious that independence is far from certain. Hence Sturgeon’s skilfully reserving her options in her conference speech.

Given, in other words, that independence remains far from imminent, some Scottish voters may well conclude that the best, fastest way to be rid of the offensive Truss and her Tory party is a Labour government. It won’t be independence, but Scotland might not get ignored or insulted quite so readily.