The Shackleton Report: Issue 15

While the SNP have continued to talk a good game in the ongoing referendum debate, political analysts are beginning to detect rumblings of frustration and discontent at party headquarters in Narnia.

The campaign is now several months removed from the great leap for Yes polling numbers which resulted from Gideon Osborne's insistence that iScotland would be forced to use the Scottish Imperial Shekel rather than the pound.

Despite the campaigning and the rhetoric, and not forgetting the fact that the No campaign has been demonstrably the worst political campaign in living memory anywhere in the world, Yes numbers have - the occasional fluctuation notwithstanding - hit something of a ceiling.

While there have been many reasons given for this apparent slowing down of momentum, including voters tiring of Nicola Sturgeon's stern face telling them off - 'Every time she comes on TV it's like getting a row from your mum,' said one voter - Dr Ian Shackleton, one of the few experts lecturing on politics and football in the country, believes that the sport formerly known as the beautiful game is entirely to blame.

'There's no question the slowing of Yes momentum is as a direct result of the World Cup,' he told me this morning, as we spoke in his office on the 98th floor of the magnificent new Jim Bett Mansions in the city's Icelandic quarter. 'It's all-consuming, and the SNP have just had to accept that the referendum campaign, like everything else in the world, has had to play second fiddle.'

While the SNP had been wary of the World Cup from the start, their dream that England would do well, thereby filling the media with stories of English glory and pissing off everyone in Scotland, fell quickly by the wayside on the back of England's complete and utter ineptitude.

'There's no escaping English sporting success in Scotland,' says TV analyst Professor Malcolm Connery, of the Glasgow Institute of Special Things.

'We share the same national news bulletins, which are of course predominantly aimed at an English audience. When England win stuff, Yes polling numbers go through the roof. But what have we learned from this World Cup? Overseas players clutch their faces, feign injury and, when they can be bothered, look brilliant.

'English players rarely cheat, looking brilliant is quite beyond them and the only time they clutch their face is in despair when they've just hoofed a corner kick straight into row Z. For the Scots it's been like looking in the mirror.'

With Scotland's arch rivals gone, it has allowed the country to wallow in the shenanigans, tricks, treats, brilliance and cheating, diving artifice of the rest of the world.

'Those Isis fellows in Iraq knew the score,' says Shackleton. 'They started taking over towns, and people were just sitting in bars watching the football going, yeah, whatever, blah blah blah, we're watching Ghana versus Germany, bugger off. So they shot the TVs. It wasn't very friendly, but seriously, they had guns, they didn't need to be. Then people were like, oh shit, no football, and there are guys with guns…!'

Rumours that the SNP have been considering sending shock troops into homes and bars around the country to shoot televisions have been strenuously denied. 'The discussions never got past the consultation phase,' said one SNP insider who wished to remain anonymous.

Instead the Yes campaign has been left to wait out the tournament. 'The good news for them,' says Shackleton, 'is that once the World Cup is over there are still two more months to get back in the game. They'll be hoping the Commonwealth Games does for their campaign what the London Olympics did for Boris Johnson.'

The First Minister is believed to be lining up a series of affairs, racist comments and comedic stunts in preparation for his anticipated Boris-bounce.

Other Referendum News From The Past Week

Thursday July 3:

David Cameron once more strode north of the border today, bringing his own homespun brand of folksy, down-to-earth rhetoric to the campaign.

Wearing nothing but a kilt, and carrying a claymore soaked in the blood of his enemies strapped across his back, the Prime Minister walked the 450 miles to Perth in under three hours, collecting a troupe of ardent supporters along the way.

His speech to a cheering audience of over 70,000 in the grounds of Scone Palace seems set to be a defining moment in the campaign, as voters could be seen visibly turning from Yes to No as he spoke.

'It's what we needed,' said Malky Eight Feet, a publishing executive from Montrose. 'This man's been to Eton, so he knows what he's talking about. Total dude, by the way. Respect.'

Bringing the message that Britain's "not as shit as you think", and that an independent Scotland would be dining with South Sudan at the aid agency Table of Desperation within months, Mr Cameron urged the "silent majority of voters" to be heard.

Noting that the phrase "silent majority" was first used in the 19th century to refer to the dead, critics have claimed that this is proof that the Coalition government are planning electoral fraud on a massive scale. As a result of the speech, Yes campaigners are predicting over two million votes to be cast for No in the name of the deceased.

Deposed Better Together kingpin, Alistair Darling, refused to comment on the allegations, but was seen to raise an eyebrow.

Political analysts, such as Dr Shackleton, are in little doubt that the Prime Minister's increasingly frequent interventions could play a decisive part on the campaign trail.

'Yes, he's condescending,' he told me this morning, 'and the only thing he has in common with your average Scotsman is that he goes bright red in the sun. Yet there's a cumulative effect at work here. These things seep into the subconscious, and the next time you hear the No campaign denouncing him for not caring about Scotland and being too feart to debate the First Minister, there's a small voice reminding you that he walked all the way from Westminster to Perth in a kilt, his testicles bared to the elements.'

The speech came the day after Mr Cameron had claimed in the House of Commons that the SNP were sending out hit squads of grey-shirted über-thugs in jackboots to intimidate business leaders who dared speak up against independence.

When asked to provide verification of his remarks, Mr Cameron cited matters of national security, but said that the claims would be substantiated when the relevant documents were released in 30 years' time.