I don't know which was worse: Yvette Cooper's arrogance in coming north and ruling out an autonomous Scottish Labour Party or Kezia Dugdale's meek acquiescence to it.

What an extraordinary spectacle. And how insensitive?

Labour's UK leadership hopefuls should surely have stuck to the line originally put forward by Andy Burnham that "there is a case" for the Scottish party to be separate. They may not actually agree with that, but it would have been nice to at least pretend the Scottish party was its own boss for a while.

What could be worse for Labour at this moment to have its branch office status confirmed? Ms Cooper said she expected the party to remain as one because of its "shared values". But what was the problem with at least considering such an arrangement here? Give the Scottish party breathing space?

But even Mr Burnham has apparently resiled on his original remarks to the BBC Marr programme last month. He now insists there is no case for a Scottish breakaway party. All the leadership candidates for UK Labour have made clear it is business as usual. It isn't.

Ms Dugdale had an opportunity here to assert herself. "Hu'd on a goddam minute, Yvette..." She could have kicked up just a tiny dust storm, suggesting it was just a little previous for the UK party to close down this debate even before it has started.

Labour's Scottish leader-in-waiting may not actually want an independent Scottish Party either but making a fuss would at least have suggested the Scottish party has a mind of its own. Isn't just an obedient subsidiary.

If Labour in Scotland had renewed itself as an independent or federal party it need not have severed all its links with the UK party.

There are many examples across Europe of parties like the CSU and the CDU in Germany which work together even though they are separate.

As for the shared values, the UK party is moving in a very different direction from the party in Scotland. South of the border the leadership candidates all say that Labour must become more pro-business, more "aspirational" and less sympathetic to immigrants and people on benefits.

This is not the case in Scotland. The SNP won a landslide here on an anti-austerity programme calling for higher public spending, fewer controls on immigration and the abandonment of the UK welfare reform programme.

The Sottish Labour Party has just had its worst election defeat in 100 years. Worse than 1931. It just lost all but one of its MPs. It can't possibly be business as usual. The tsunami was the clearest possible message that all political parties in Scotland now have to place Scotland first. The "shared values" if such exist come second.

Even Jim Murphy recognised the need for change and even proposed a different constitution for the Scottish party. His "New Clause 4" promising "total devolution on policy". Was that all just rhetoric? Nat-wash?

If that clause had meant anything at all it should have meant that UK Labour politicians could not just continue to lay down the law.

Labour seems determined to repeat the Scottish Tories' mistake after their Scottish wipeout in 1997. They stuck with a toxic brand which was no longer politically viable in Scotland.

As Murdo Fraser argued, the Tories should have renamed themselves something like the Scottish Peoples Party or the Progressive Party or even the Scottish Unionist Party to escape from the taint of that UK connection.

Theatre is everything in politics.

If senior UK Labour politicians can still come on day trips to Scotland telling the party what it should be doing can anyone seriously believe that Labour has changed in Scotland?

I thought Labour had a good chance of making a spirited comeback at the Scottish parliamentary elections in 2016. Now I'm not so sure. Christmas has come early for Nicola Sturgeon.