Bring back, Jack, bring back Jack…was being ever so quietly chanted in the corridors of the Parliament two weeks ago after the weekly ritual bear baiting and then a little more loudly last week, following a yawn-inducing FMQs when clearly with no particular plan in place, other than to avoid further ridicule over the constitution, Wendy Alexander resorted to the tried and tested strategy of waving the white flag and surrendering to the enemy. If Labour is looking for a vision, it still hasn’t found it. After a week of twists, turns and twirls, the party is no better off than before Wendy launched into her extraordinary ‘benderendum’ despite what Malcolm Chisholm so loyally claims. Two weeks ago, Scottish Labour was seen as just a party without a vision, a party unable to get to grips with opposition and a party being dragged down by events and personalities at Westminster. Two weeks ago, there was a shred of hope that its beleaguered chief would rally round and really start to make a difference but sadly, that glimmer has gone. For a year now, the Labour Party in Scotland has been shocked senseless and in the absence of any real plan, has been reactive rather than proactive, led by grudge and grievance. It claims to be holding the SNP to book but instead can claim only two slight dents; Trump and MacDonald and even they don’t amount to much more than a hill of beans and a government trying to do what’s best for its economy. While the Conservative Party has grasped the nettle and understood clearly how to make political advantage from a minority government, Labour has remained stuck in a groove of ya-boo politics, believing that its role was to carp, curse and criticise. Commentators, myself included, have grown increasingly impatient, urging members to find a reason for being, to adopt a big cause and to make a difference. Take unravelling issues like Local Income Tax and the Futures Trust and hold the SNP to account, do the forensic analysis and tell us why they are wrong and unworkable. But no, two weeks ago, Wendy Alexander threw her party into a crisis over the constitution. Now, on paper, you couldn’t get much bigger than that but no bluff was called, the SNP had always stated that a referendum would be called in 2010, no points earned and the public were just left bewildered. What did Wendy want? Another broken manifesto promise? If there was anyone in the slightest bit credible standing behind Wendy Alexander right now, she would be gone but still she clings on, having dragged her party into a humiliating battle of words, having relinquished any moral right to say ‘no’ to a referendum on independence, having shown that while she can stand up to Gordon Brown, he still wins, even when he is fast becoming a national loser and more crucially, her own colleagues at Holyrood, who have so loyally stood behind her, have been dropped on from a very great height. Labour Group meetings have become a farce. Certain front-bench members have become conspicuous by their absence, others conspicuous by their silence. Wendy has not just lost the potential control of a country. It is ironic that football or at least the national disgrace of violence that followed that so-called beautiful game last week in Manchester, became the unifying point for parties in the Scottish Parliament, who have spent the last 12 months playing a game of two very separate halves. It’s just a shame that it was done out of self-preservation rather than genuine concern for a nation’s reputation.

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