IF there’s one thing that gets the opposition out of bed in the morning, it’s the founding mission of the SNP. Like turkeys with a morbid fascination for Christmas, the Tories, Labour and the LibDems just can’t stop gobbling on about independence.
All three party leaders raised it at FMQs, as Nicola Sturgeon talked about anything else.
The First Minister was “obsessing about another referendum”, said Ruth Davidson after the FM talked about the NHS and taxes.
She was playing “a game of Russian roulette with the constitution”, said Kezia Dugdale, after the FM discussed education and councils.
As for Willie Rennie... “Yet again this week the Parliament and Government have been dominated by independence,” he said, as a neutral observer. “SNP members laugh, but it is the Government that is obsessed with independence.” Gobble, gobble.
“I don't know how Willie Rennie spent his week,” replied Ms Sturgeon, suspecting a fetid bedroom filled with crazily annotated copies of the Scotland Act.
“But mine has been dominated by talking about nurses, education and getting more students into university.”
As the FM has waged war on the Sewel Convention all week, the hooting was intense.
She then brought up Brexit before talking about the budget. Mr Rennie was incensed.
“The FM started her answer by denying being obsessed with independence. She then spent almost all the rest doing exactly that!”
Ms Sturgeon gave her best condescending glower: “I will give Willie Rennie a tip. If he doesn’t want me to answer on a particular issue, he shouldn’t ask me about it.”
Later, Tory man-sloth Gordon Lindhurst blinked to life.
In a trademark monotone that makes time run backward, Chloroform Gordon asked about NHS Lothian spending £4.8m on agency nurses and midwives last year.
“Thaaat,” he said over the course of what was surely a month, was “a humongous” sum.
The word humongous hung in the air, the sole bright spot in a speech of interminable night.
The FM asked why he was not as curious about English nurses.
“I have not heard him ask the Prime Minister to take responsibility for the report in July that an NHS trust paid more than £2000 for a single agency shift.”
Mr Lindhurst gave an offended blink and drowsily hugged his branch again. If he ever gets through to the PM, she might be lucky enough to sleep through Brexit.
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