Nicola Sturgeon knew that Boris Johnson couldn’t accept her invitation

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Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon speaks to the media as she visits the Thornliebank Dental Care centre during the election campaign in Glasgow (REUTERS)

“Welcome to my parlour”, said the spider to the fly. This old saying comes to mind when I contemplate Nicola Sturgeon’s invitation to Boris Johnson to wait on her in Bute House while he is in Scotland.

Ms Sturgeon knows perfectly well that a prime minister has his diary arranged long in advance, and that two days’ notice is not enough for him to change his plans, barring an emergency.

This invitation – issued on Twitter as well as by post – was designed to receive a negative response. It was couched as a proposed meeting between two persons of equal stature, and no doubt the two saltires that greeted Theresa May at Bute House would again have been pressed into service, to impress on Johnson that he was on Sturgeon’s territory, in her fiefdom.