NICOLA Sturgeon’s referendum fudge didn’t have many takers at Holyrood yesterday.
Her decision to delay her bill for a new independence vote was an unappetising failure dressed up as virtue.
The First Minister may have pitched it as a considered response to the SNP's election result, but in truth the bill was going nowhere.
Theresa May has already refused to grant Holyrood the power to get it moving, a so-called Section 30 order, by saying “now is not the time”.
When Ms Sturgeon wrote to her about an order in March, she demanded “early discussions” and said a vote by MSPs on the matter “must be respected and progressed”.
But Mrs May is still blocking a Section 30 order and Ms Sturgeon is currently impotent.
Hence the charade of delaying a bill that she wasn’t able to advance in the first place.
“The urgency of agreeing that Section 30 order is not what it was previously,” as Ms Sturgeon put it unconvincingly.
The Unionist parties had been expecting something far more substantial.
But surprise quickly turned to delight when Ms Sturgeon said she was leaving a referendum on the table, and would return in autumn 2018 to set out her “precise timescale” for a vote.
It means the anti-SNP, anti-referendum attack lines which proved so useful to the Tories, Labour and LibDems remain in place.
The SNP also repeated the ham-fisted move last seen when Ms Sturgeon announced her original timetable in March, by launching a new fundraising website.
Even as the First Minister was speaking about a delay in parliament, the party run by husband was firing the starting gun on the next campaign.
It immediately added charges of hypocrisy and deceit to the Unionist armoury.
But those choking hardest on the fudge were the SNP’s erstwhile allies, the Greens, who wanted Ms Sturgeon to stick to her original timetable and have a vote before Brexit.
Green co-convener Patrick Harvie was furious that while other EU nations voted on the Brexit deal, Scots wouldn't get a say in time to avoid leaving the EU.
Even as Ms Sturgeon tries to energise the Yes movement, one of her key partners is edging away from her, wondering what misstep will come next.
The First Minister's attempt to offer something to voters, her party and the Yes movement may end up pleasing none of them.
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