Boris Johnson has gambled – time for the SNP to be just as bold

I’m guessing very, very few Scots fall into the latter category. Of course, most folk north of the border voted not to leave the EU or to have a Tory government in the first place. But there’s another factor – the Scots’ strong belief in systems, process, officialdom and upholding the law, a belief that will have been shaken to the core by Boris Johnson’s casual abuse of power. Unlike the revolutionary Irish and the cottage-burning Welsh, the Scots are almost compulsively law-abiding – God love us. Perhaps that comes from having our own legal system. Perhaps it betrays the undue influence of cautious professionals in our civic life. Perhaps we are easily feart. Perhaps, 90% of the time, that’s correct and canny. Whatever the reason, the Scots are big on fairness. As the late William McIlvanney put it, Scotland’s slogan isn’t “Wha daur mess wi me”, it’s “That’s no fair”.

And thanks to Boris Johnson’s high-handed attack on parliamentary democracy yesterday, Scotland’s constitutional predicament is now visibly “no fair” – on steroids. We are set to crash out of the EU against our will because of British democratic structures – a Westminster voting system that isn’t fair, a second chamber whose privileged composition is so unfair it can hardly flex its muscles – and is set to get even worse as Boris stuffs the Lords with Leave-supporting peers. The “winner takes all” system of governance gives unfair and total power to minority governments and the “one size fits all” approach to EU membership means Scotland and Northern Ireland will be dragged out of the EU, no matter how desperate the consequences. The Queen’s decision to accept the Prime Minister’s unofficial declaration of war on the Commons demonstrates the monarch is no democratic backstop – as Scottish Greens co-leader Patrick Harvie said yesterday: “Any head of state worthy of the title would just have said no.” So much for the idea that the Commons is a “sovereign parliament” and so much also for the Unionist insistence that Holyrood is not under threat, when its rights, budget and very existence lack the supposedly statutory underpinning enjoyed by the soon-to-be-suspended Commons?

In short, none of Britain’s constitutional armour has been effective against a politician who’s correctly calculated he can ride roughshod over all parliamentary conventions because they are too weak, antiquated and democratically invalid to let MPs fight back.

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Yet against this backdrop of profound, visible, centuries-long, systematic, structural unfairness and ineptitude, the only thing that focuses the minds and riles the majority of English voters is “rule by an unelected Brussels elite”.

This skewed focus, this selective blindness, this collective madness should worry every inhabitant of Scotland. Our developing political system has proved itself largely immune from the dangerous displacement activity occurring down south. The majority of Scots don’t believe that re-establishing the “greatness” of Britain through some sort of splendid isolation and a return to the empty, exploitation of Empire is any answer for the problems we face. And at long last, thanks to brazen Boris Johnson, it’s not just “axe-grinding nationalists” who can see that.

Can anything stop his No-Deal Brexit and precedent-creating suspension of Parliament? Who knows, but it’s looking very much like game, set and match to Boris – except, perhaps for the legal action being conducted in Edinburgh’s Court of Session. How ironic that a Scottish judge may be the last line of defence for British democracy. But whether the suspension is ruled unconstitutional, and that ruling comes in time to make a difference, Boris Johnson’s attack on the Commons has already reshaped the independence proposition.

Is it fair for politicians to force their vision and version of democracy on everyone else, just because they can? If that’s the way the Union works, do No voters still feel they belong?

Today, “our” Prime Minister, aided by spinmeister Dominic Cummings, stands revealed as a disruptive, calculating, ruthless wide-boy, who’s prepared to chuck “sacrosanct” democratic conventions under the cart to steam roller through a realignment of trading relationships and political values, completing Britain’s isolation from the social democratic traditions of mainland Europe and transformation into the 51st state of Trump’s casualised and de-regulated America.

My guess is that most swithering No voters view the first lengthy suspension of the Commons since the Second World War as a dangerous step too far. Ironically, the “Mother of Parliaments” myth is the main reason many cautious, risk-averse, status-quo favouring Scots have remained wedded to the Union for so long.

For centuries, the presumed superiority of British democracy has prompted Labour and Tory voters to tolerate centralised, elitist structures. Checks and balances – they were just for “younger” democracies with no in-built sense of fair play. Written constitutions – who needed them in an uncomplicated system without PR, co-operation or rule books?

No, Britain worked perfectly well without formal constraints on power because politicians would always resist the urge to abuse its unwritten constitution.

Aye right.

Now, in one day, that myth has been exploded.

With one sweeping, blatant lie, Boris Johnson has exposed the fact that naked power has always underpinned British democracy. Suddenly, Westminster looks extremely tawdry. Especially, I imagine, to duped and betrayed former No voters.

After all, Yessers have long since abandoned any belief in the fairness of British democracy.

But No voters have kept the faith – until today. You have to believe in a system to be totally banjaxed by the clear demonstration of its impotence. No voters always believed the structures of British democracy were fair and fit for purpose.

They never were. From conversations I’m having with No voters, that dawning realisation is having a massive effect.

So, Nicola Sturgeon is right. This is the week British democracy died.

But it won’t become the week independence replaced it as Scotland’s viable alternative future without a Boris-like sense of urgency, a fleshed-out vision and a strategy – or in fact several. Yet few senior SNP politicians believe any strategy exists.

The First Minister’s law-abiding streak may have worked when her adversary was the cautious Theresa May, but times have changed, Boris is in charge, all bets are off and bold, disruptive, calculated risk-taking is the new order of the day.

The Yes movement is ready – will the SNP leadership finally respond?