‘Dexy’s Conundrum’ strikes as SNP and Tories clash over devolution – John McLellan

The Scottish Government demands action, the UK Government takes it but is then condemned, writes John McLellan.

Nicola Sturgeon and her party will make sure the conclusion to their assembly is that devolution isn't working, says John McLellan

It’s what I’ve previously called “Dexy’s Conundrum”, the seemingly contradictory SNP dislike of initiatives coming from London with which they were previously happy or, as with the latest case, they were apparently demanding themselves.

It goes back to my days working in a Glasgow hotel bar where staff were allowed to bring in cassettes to play on the sound system and how the Van Morrison original of Jackie Wilson Said on my tape was met with derision. At the time, the Dexy’s Midnight Runners’ cover version was riding high in the charts and when the song came on, one of my colleagues yelped “Oh I love Dexy’s”. But when I pointed out it was Van the Man himself, she instantly snapped “That’s sh**e”, even though the remake was a faithful tribute to the original. It wasn’t played by the band she liked so, by definition, it was garbage.

Last year’s Dexy’s Conundrum was the SNP’s contentment for powers to reside in Brussels but not for those same controls to be held in London, and this week it was the reaction to soon to be ex-Prime Minister Theresa May’s new review of how the UK Government responds to devolution.

Broken by The Scotsman on Tuesday and confirmed in a speech in Stirling on Thursday as part of her farewell tour policy frenzy, she has asked ex-Scotland Office minister Lord Andrew Dunlop, a former special adviser to both John Major and David Cameron, to examine how Whitehall works with the devolved administrations. At issue is whether the devolved nations should continue to have separate ministerial departments or, as Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson has proposed, there should be a “Union Delivery Unit”.

Ms Davidson knows Lord Dunlop very well, first working closely with him in the independence referendum campaign. He recently led her Scottish Future Growth Council, and he has a clear steer from a recent article explaining why the unit was needed to ensure “UK legislation is devolution-compatible, that businesses from across the home nations are involved in helping draw up trade policy ... and that civil servants and ministers have a genuine understanding of how power is shared and policy delivered”. Nothing unreasonable, and although Mrs May will be gone in a fortnight, both candidates vying to replace her have clearly expressed their ambition to strengthen the union and the winner would create unnecessary difficulty if he ignored Ruth Davidson or the Dunlop Review.

It would be asking too much for the SNP to welcome the review, but the instant reaction was splenetic denouncement as “desperate” and “meaningless”, even though only a fortnight ago First Minister Nicola Sturgeon argued the UK Government had to change the way it interacted with the devolved nations.

“Formal frameworks such as the Joint Ministerial Committee are not functioning effectively ... meetings only happen when the UK Government chooses. And the committee’s decisions are not binding anyway,” she told the Law Society of Scotland. “There is no sign – none whatsoever – that the UK Government recognises the need for fundamental change,” she added. But having recognised just such a need for change, the First Minister could not have been more dismissive: “It’s for the Scottish people – not a Tory PM – to consider and decide what future we want for our Parliament and country.”

Condemned either for action or inaction, the UK Government can’t win, but the clue is in that Law Society speech, when she said that the Scottish Government had commissioned its own assessment which would “draw heavily on academic expertise”.

Like the supposedly independent Citizen’s Assembly, now postponed as hastily as it was launched, the SNP will make sure the conclusion is devolution isn’t working. And whatever the Dunlop Review produces, the SNP reaction will be similar to that of a barmaid discovering her favourite Dexy’s tune is being sung by a wee Ulsterman.

General Melchett looks set to lead Tories over the top...

I was in Perth last night for the Scottish leg of the Hunt v Johnson World Series, eagerly awaited by both Scottish camps but sadly too late for the Perspective section deadlines. It’s been a job to keep up with the flurry of pledges from both candidates, but Mr Hunt laid the groundwork for the Scottish event yesterday with an article aimed at the Scottish business community.

On Thursday all members were posted short candidate statements and again the Johnson contribution was functional, rounded off with a Boris flourish, sounding rather like General Melchett from Blackadder Goes Forth: “This is it folks. No second chances. Choose me and I will deliver Brexit, unite our country and beat Corbyn.”

Mr Hunt included links to a campaign video, his 10-point Brexit plan and his recent Policy Exchange speech, and dismiss him as a try-hard if you like, but at least he comes across as someone who knows the keys to Number 10 must be fought for.

The ballot papers start landing today and whatever happens both sides will have to work together, but with a Conservative Home survey putting Mr Johnson’ on 67 per cent, no wonder his people think it’s in the bag.

... As Monty defends position in France

Out leafleting down Mountcastle way near where new Brexit MEP Brian Monteith used to live, a craggy old builder shouted, “Whit are ye sellin’?” When I replied politics, he fired back “Brexit Party? Send them all hame...” “No, sorry, Conservative,” I said, to which he immediately rasped, “Ach, they’re a waste ay f***in’ space” and got on with his digging. I’ll put you down as a maybe, sir. Not every Scot is being dragged out the EU against their will...

Meanwhile Monty was in a typically bullish mood on Newsnight when quizzed by Emily Maitlis about his party’s back-turning stunt at the European Parliament opening, swatting off questions about his French residence as “Remoaner diversion tactics”. Whatever his current address and his new party’s politics may be, thousands of Geordies put their cross next to his box.

In the same show, Lib Dem MEP Martin Horwood claimed “Nobody wants a super state”, despite new EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen once saying she didn’t “see a loose association controlled by the national interests of a few states”.

As I wrote here recently, there are plenty Eurocrats who see Britain as a drag on “ever closer union” and the Lib Dems in Bollocks to Brexit tee-shirts are deluding themselves as much as Brian and the Bring on Brexit brigade who argue only milk and honey awaits us.