LAST week’s focus was on the Supreme Court rather than Parliament with its judgement on a referendum.

Why the Scottish Government thought going there was a strategy is inexplicable. The outcome was never in doubt and the First Minister knew that along with any first-year law student. It’s why, although there’s been a sterile debate about a vote next year, neither side believed it nor even bothered to prepare for it. It suited them, though, to say there was going to be one. But where do we go from here?

It was the late Tory PM Harold Macmillan who stated that the Union had to be “of the wedding ring not the handcuff”. Indeed, he’s the last UK Tory leader ever to win a General Election in Scotland. Even Margaret Thatcher said that if the Scots voted for independence, then they would have it. But not anymore, apparently. That’s simply unacceptable.

A government continually rejected by the Scottish people cannot simply say no when they’re exploiting our resources and imposing austerity and misery. It’s why a constitutional convention must be called. That should be made up of Scottish MPs and MSPs who have a democratic mandate. Along with others from Civic Scotland, they must make it clear that the people of Scotland are sovereign. That has always been the position in Scotland and was eloquently made clear many years ago by the late Canon Kenyon Wright.

That convention was promised by Nicola Sturgeon in February 2020 and now needs delivered urgently. It’s the people of Scotland who must decide, one way or another. That a referendum is available in Ireland every seven years makes the Scottish position perverse.

The failings of post-Brexit Britain are increasing, with the economy tanking and fundamentally rotten at its core.

That a Tory peer was paid tens of millions from contracts for PPE equipment which proved useless is disgraceful.

Scotland can do so much better than this.