The National:

GEORGE Galloway’s bid to save the Union hasn’t got off to the greatest of starts.

Sure, he’s excited some of the more excitable Yoons on the old Twittersphere, but those poor dears have spent most of the last year relying on Jackson Carlaw and Richard Leonard for their bit of vim and vigour.

If you spent months eating fish fingers, of course you’re going to get crazy when someone comes along doling out cheese on toast.

And if there’s one thing Galloway can do well, it’s putting on a show. However, even those of us who’ve spent a fair whack of time watching the former TV cat impersonator were shocked when the needy failed-politician-turned-Kremlin-backed-shock-jock said he was willing to work with the Tories to stop independence.

He told the Sunday Mail his new Alliance for Unity would “work with everybody to get the SNP out of power”.

Asked if some Tory voters might be turned off casting their ballot for him given his political history, Galloway said: “If they are voting for me and my list, it’s only to oppose the SNP.

“Any other political differences we may have are secondary to our wish to see an end to this endless grudge and division. And, so far, I think there are quite a lot of takers for that.

READ MORE: It's not that anyone thinks Leonard's doing a good job; just no-one cares

“To win one seat, we’ll need about 16,000 votes but I think we’ll win far more than one in the south of Scotland – and there are many other parts of Scotland where we’ll do very well.”

That’s a helluva U-turn for a once socialist firebrand.

Just how much a U-turn, you might well wonder?

Well, as one reader with a long memory pointed out to us, back in 2014, the ex-MP was asked if he’d ever consider working with Better Together to strengthen the No vote, he answered: “If you ever see me standing under a Union Jack shoulder-to-shoulder with a Conservative, please shoot me.”

Jings. That's some change in just six years. Makes you wonder what the Galloway of 2026 is going to be like.

So what’s the big change in the last half-decade? Probably just that the former Glasgow MP is now a very accomplished loser.

In 2015, he lost his Bradford West seat by 11,420 votes. An incredible achievement considering he was defending a majority of more than 10,000.

In 2016 he came 7th in the London mayoral election, just ahead of Britain First.

He fared a little better at the snap election in 2017, coming third in the Manchester Gorton with 5.7% of the vote.

Luckily in Britain you don’t have to wait too long for an election to come along, and so, in 2019 he got his chance to lose again, standing in West Bromwich East as an independent.

He came sixth with 489 votes.