Independence: Johnson’s head-in-sand act makes Scotland leaving UK more likely, Rebecca McQuillan

But he came anyway, in an attempt to present aspects of his Government’s pandemic response as a reason for Scots to reject the lure of independence.

UK Government advisers know full well that Boris Johnson is particularly unpopular in Scotland and have decided to push on regardless, take the fight to the SNP and stop being apologetic about their opposition to independence. It’s a strategy. And perhaps the problems with the messenger could have been mitigated a little with the right message.

But while there was validity in some of the benefits the Prime Minister claimed for the union, his remarks underlined a fundamental problem: how unevolved the UK Government’s thinking on the union seems to be since Theresa May’s early days. In response to the SNP’s push for independence, the mantra is still resist rather than reform. Many Scottish voters will agree with Mr Johnson that fighting the pandemic is more important than another referendum, but it is not a binary choice. There is still no sign that ministers accept the need for the way Britain is run fundamentally to change.

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Perhaps Mr Johnson thinks sticking to the old playbook will stymie the SNP’s referendum plans long enough for him to leave office without becoming the Prime Minister who presided over the break-up of the UK (the SNP’s 11-point plan to achieve a referendum against his will notwithstanding). If so, he will just be making it harder for his successor to win the argument.

His government has to be able to offer those decisive swing voters the promise of a positive alternative to the status quo, but there’s no sign of a willingness to do so.

The most immediate problem he faces of course is his almost comically low approval rating in Scotland. Brexit, which Scots didn’t vote for, moved the dial in favour of independence before the pandemic, but what’s tipped the scales in favour of leaving since then is voters’ judgments about the competency of the respective UK and Scottish governments. They clearly think that Nicola Sturgeon is vastly more able and trustworthy than Boris Johnson and many believe an independent Scotland would have handled the pandemic better.

UK ministers must sometimes wonder how Nicola Sturgeon does it. The infection and death rates are lower in Scotland than in England, but are still high by comparison with many other nations. The answer is that she is seen as responsible, consistent and honest, unlike her UK counterpart.

But what of the substance of Mr Johnson’s arguments, that being part of the UK has benefited Scotland through the vaccine programme, high public spending and military support?

Well, if Scotland had been an independent country within the EU right now, we would presumably be in the same boat as the other EU 27, struggling with a low supply of vaccines, assuming Holyrood did not have a novel side-agreement with London.

The distribution of precious vaccine globally is a fraught and important issue in itself and there clearly needs to be international cooperation to ensure that healthcare workers and the vulnerable are not missing out on the vaccine in one country while low risk people are being vaccinated in others.

But that is not where we are. Across the Scotland and the UK, vulnerable people and health workers are still being immunised and at an impressive rate.

Mr Johnson has also pointed to the UK Government’s funding of a massive public spending boost in Scotland and of the furlough scheme. Presenting that as a unique benefit of being in the UK only works if people think an independent Scotland couldn’t have done the same. So could it? It would of course have borrowing powers, but the implicit point is that the UK government has been able to borrow colossal amounts at low cost. The likely cost of borrowing to an independent Scotland was much discussed before the 2014 referendum, with some economists concluding that the new nation would have to pay more than the UK government to service its debt.

But will such dry hypothetical arguments about the economics of independence change anyone’s mind at this time of frustration and pandemic fatigue? Unlikely.

It’s just not enough. For years now, prime ministers have been coming to Scotland to extol the benefits of the union. This PM, we are told, will be more robust than the others, but when Mr Johnson visited yesterday, it felt like we’d seen it all before.

And perhaps the most striking thing of all was what was absent from his comments: humility. Two months ago, Boris Johnson described devolution to Tory MPs as a “disaster” and Tony Blair’s “biggest mistake”, which gave us an insight into his reactionary instincts on the issue. There’s no sign yet that he has accepted the structural problem that underlies the rise in support for independence: that the status quo isn’t working any more.

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There has to be a positive alternative on offer, one which would give Scots more say over their own futures while retaining the benefits of being part of a larger family of nations. Sure, to a committed Scottish nationalist, such an offer is hopelessly inadequate, but those who will decide a future referendum are middle ground voters many of whom would likely opt for a third way if one were available.

This isn’t just about Scotland any more at any rate; it’s about the English regions, which have discovered their voice and their own political identity. Gordon Brown, Sir David Steel and others have advocated reform of the House of Lords to create a senate of the nations and regions, Brown saying earlier this week that “the choice is now between a reformed state and a failed state”. Federalism, as Keir Starmer’s Labour seems to have accepted, is the UK’s best defence against break-up.

Blocking a referendum will only entrench views. It’s not a long-term strategy but then that’s what we’ve come to expect from this Prime Minister

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