Uk politics

I suspect that the Scottish Labour gala dinner in Glasgow tonight won’t feel like much of a gala. The Scottish Labour party is in crisis: its leader has quit attacking the UK Labour party for treating it like a ‘branch office’ and now an Ipsos-Mori Westminster voting intention poll has the SNP on 52 per cent to Labour’s 23 per cent. This poll is a reminder of the scale of the challenge facing whoever is the new leader of the Scottish Labour party. I argue in the magazine this week  that Jim Murphy is, by a distance, the best candidate for the job. He has what Scottish Labour so desperately needs right now: energy, no fear of the SNP and its agenda and the ability to win elections. But Murphy’s victory is, by no means, a done deal.

Grotesque. Unbelievable. Bizarre. Unprecedented. Today's Ipsos-Mori opinion poll is the most astonishing survey of Scottish political opinion in living memory. Perhaps, even, the most remarkable survey of all time. It is, of course, a snapshot not a prediction. The actual election will not produce anything like these numbers. I don't believe the SNP will win 52% of the Scottish vote in May. I don't believe the Labour party will take 23% of votes. And I don't actually believe the Conservatives will only be supported by 10% of voters. Still, there is something happening in Scotland right now. The electorate is volatile. Just a month ago Survation reported Labour's support (amongst decided voters) at 39% and the SNP on 35%.

Just to make Scottish Labour's misery complete - and underline the case for a bold leader who likes winning things - STV have published a poll by Ipsos Mori putting Ed Miliband's party on just 23 per cent, which would see them losing all but four of their Scottish MPs, against 52 per cent support for the SNP, which would get 54 Westminster seats. The question was how would those surveyed vote if there were a general election tomorrow. The Scottish Conservatives would lose their one seat, with 10 per cent of the vote, the Lib Dems would retain one with 6 per cent, while the Greens polled 6 per cent, Ukip 2 per cent and others 1 per cent.

The main business of the day in the House of Commons is Labour's debate on Lord Freud, a row that blew up nearly a fortnight ago. The party's motion, entitled 'Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Welfare Reform and disabled people', finishes with '. . . this House has no confidence in the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Welfare Reform; and calls on the Prime Minister to dismiss him.' It's not a wise move to put any money on David Cameron meeting this demand, given that Freud apologised on the same day his comments about disabled people and the minimum wage were raised at Prime Minister's Questions. Unless you've got a lot of time on your hands, it might not be wise to sit through the entire debate, both sides of which can be summarised in these three points: 1.

What's next for David Cameron's tussle with Brussels? The Prime Minister made clear yesterday that 'we are not paying a sum anything like' the £1.7 billion demanded by the European Commission last week, and now the focus is on how much he can get the bill reduced by. He will have to pay a bill, but to maintain credibility, the Prime Minister must end up paying something much smaller than the original demand. Next week George Osborne and other European finance ministers will hold emergency talks on the bill, and today Number 10 set out what the Chancellor plans to say at those talks.

Today's Independent explains why the Tory party is starting to get rather jitter again. Sure, Labour has fallen five points to level-peg with the party in a ComRes poll for the paper, with both on 30 per cent, but as Mike Smithson points out, the party could still be losing seats to the Opposition even if it secures a 6 per cent lead. But the poll also has Ukip on 19 per cent after the shock bill from Brussels. As I reported yesterday, MPs were already picking up on voter concern about this on the doorstep - and a poll for the Times found most voters through he would pay up in the end anyway. Labour won't be particularly buoyed by the poll either, though Douglas Alexander has warned his party that it will see these sorts of figures in an era of four-party politics.

Tory MPs might have appeared keen to support the PM after his surprise EU bill when they spoke in the Commons this afternoon. But behind the scenes the party is in a pretty precarious situation. Open unrest is being held back by two things: a realisation among backbenchers that they do need to hunker down as a by-election approaches and the General Election draws nearer, and the Prime Minister's pledge that 'we are not paying a sum anything like that'. But neither is guaranteed to keep critics quiet forever. Backbenchers point out that the current party loyalty at the moment is motivated by a desire to beat Labour - and a belief that the Conservatives really can do that.

At the risk of intruding into someone else's calamity, if you can't enjoy this what can you enjoy? By this I mean, of course, Scottish Labour's meltdown. (Suggestions the party is not actually an iced lollipop should not be taken too seriously.) The thing to remember about Labour in Scotland is they've never been as popular as they like to think. They've only ever been the largest minority. A large and zombified minority, to be sure, but a minority nonetheless. They never - ever - spoke for a majority of Scots. They only claimed to. They still do. That's the astonishing thing. They are the people's army, the political will of the Scottish people made flesh. And how dare anyone else suggest otherwise. Inconveniently, a fair few folk have dared make just that suggestion. The bastards.