COMRADES, even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while but, unfortunately for Scottish Labour, voting against Trident at their party conference left members far from bright-eyed and bushy tailed. Just like the aforementioned species has its own internal struggle, with the greys battling the reds, the Labour Party is seemingly trapped in a never-ending war of attrition, with Commander Corbyn and General Dugdale behaving less like they’re ordering soldiers, and more like they’re herding tree-rats.

Labour are determined to stand on a platform of contradictions. Looking at their political rap-sheet, they’ve been back from the dead more times than Kenny from South Park and have changed their tune more times than David Bowie and, as a result, nobody knows what they actually stand for. While it was undoubtedly heartening to see Scottish Labour vote decisively against the splurging of billions of pounds on a political status symbol, it wasn’t long before their Westminster superiors were keelhauling them for voicing an opinion of their own. To any rational voter, this seemed like the equivalent of a parent scolding a child for saying something intelligent.

The feeling of “too little too late” is also hard to ignore when it comes to the Trident vote. It has been obvious for a long time that Scottish Labour’s lust for power far outweighs its sense of moral courage, and this arrogance shines through in its present leader, Kezia Dugdale. Unlike Ruth Davidson, who has trumped Labour in the polls by building a reputation for espousing consistent yet marginalised rhetoric, Dugdale couldn’t care less about developing a constant and well-defined political message. Her parliamentary identity is based solely around attacking her opposition.

In footballing terms, Kezia’s only strategy is to send 11 talentless strikers towards her adversary’s goal and pray nobody notices her own undefended net. Case and point would be her short-sighted attack on the SNP’s approach to tax credit cuts; a fight that perhaps did more to highlight her own lack of planning than deliver a knockout to Nationalists. Worse yet, the followership she obsessively jabs at is the very group she wishes to convert to her party. Why she thinks accusing these voters of being “mindless robots” is a better strategy than explaining clearly what the Labour Party represents remains a mystery.

At this stage, Dugdale seems more likely to blame the SNP when she gets the “approval needed” message at a self-service till, rather than rationally engage with the shop attendant. Watching her lead Scottish Labour is like watching a giraffe running across an ice rink. Similarly, Jeremy Corbyn’s attempts to bring some degree of compassion and rationality to London Labour has been akin to a sheep helping a pack of wolves navigate a bouncy castle.

Certainly, there’s a cruel irony to Scottish Labour being largely anti-Trident, yet having a leader who favours its renewal, while the Labour Party are generally supportive of Trident, but boast a leader who is vice-president of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. Likewise, London Labour are habitually accused of being Tory-lite while supposedly being an opposition party; meanwhile, Scottish Labour seem to be emulating SNP policy, while maintaining Nationalists are the scum of the earth.

Tragically, there was a time when it seemed this political quandary was going to be rationalised into an SNP-Labour alliance to vanquish the Tories, but the incompetence of those running Labour vetoed this progressive concept. Now, the Scottish electorate are left with a simple question: what is Labour’s northern branch office actually for? Too autonomous to cease to exist; not autonomous enough to have an impact on anything. If they are as serious as they claim to be about being a standalone party, then Scotland’s separation from the UK is surely a logical corollary.

Of course, to pursue this would be an admission that independence was always the answer, and that Scottish Labour were wrong to side with Better Together in 2014. Dugdale questioning how the SNP will protect Scotland from Tory rule when her party more or less facilitated this is absurd, frankly. Until Labour find an effective means to address their political amnesia, they will remain little more than a bizarre sideshow within Scottish politics. Meanwhile, independence will remain the main event and the spotlight will only grow brighter with every Labour blunder.