WHEN Stewart Hosie opted to resign from his position as deputy leader of the SNP it heralded a raft of comment that perhaps the luck that Nicola Sturgeon has carried since becoming party leader was beginning to evaporate. That Mr Hosie is technically the second most powerful figure in the SNP and that his soon-to-be-former wife is a close friend of Nicola Sturgeon and holds a crucial position in her Holyrood cabinet seemed to suggest that the First Minister is no longer the arbiter of everything that occurs within her orbit. Events are beginning to conspire against her, say the right-wing commentariat.

Nothing though, could be further from the truth. When Mr Hosie was unveiled as the party’s new deputy leader at the party’s annual conference last year the gasps that greeted the announcement were not merely expressions of surprise; in there too were some expressions of disappointment. Hosie, thought to be a decent organiser, was felt to possess a quantum of arrogance disproportionate to his gifts. The word ‘effective’ was used a lot. In politics, “effective” is often used as a substitute for “uninspiring”. His departure will give Ms Sturgeon the opportunity to tighten her control of the party and to re-exert some much-needed iron discipline at Westminster.

Long before news of the lively romantic adventures of Hosie and Angus McNeil were made public it was possible to discern a measure of disquiet being displayed by some of the more diligent Nationalist MPs that perhaps their work ethic was not being universally shared. Everyone was entitled to enjoy a honeymoon period of a week or two but it was clear that some were turning that into a year-long sabbatical.

Mr Hosie’s elevation rendered the Westminster contingent ripe for civil strife and factionalism. It now meant there were, effectively, three big male beasts in positions of leadership within the SNP 56. Angus Robertson is a very able and much admired leader of the Westminster group, but exerting your authority on an unexpectedly large and disparate group becomes more difficult when it also includes the father of the party (Alex Salmond) and Mr Hosie, its new deputy leader. With a period of astute lobbying the First Minister can ensure that the appointment of her new deputy can help her bring an end to the Westminster stag party.

It also gives her an opportunity to define much more clearly what she means by the fabled “summer drive for independence”. Since this “initiative” was announced not one party member or activist I know has the remotest idea of what this will entail or for what purpose it is being conducted. The choice of Mr Hosie as the man to steer it was being seen in some quarters as a sign that Ms Sturgeon saw the “summer drive for independence” as a means of fobbing off those many among the rank-and-file who continue to be bitterly disappointed that there was no commitment to a second independence referendum in the party’s Holyrood 2016 election manifesto.

As deputy leader Mr Hosie had to be given something worthwhile to do, but not anything that would be regarded as deeply meaningful or significant. If the First Minister is serious about her summer drive then she needs to appoint someone who is seriously good to lead it. Mr Hosie, good politician that he is, was never that man.

So, when exactly will this summer drive for independence begin? Presumably, it will be after the Europe referendum on June 23, as the result of that might come to have a significant bearing on the timetable for a second referendum. Will there be a major launch event and, if so, will there be a slogan and a defined goal? You can’t really have a drive for independence if it doesn’t include a timetable.

You will forgive me for expressing a degree of cynicism at this initiative. If independence is to be gained it will require a good deal more than a summer drive; it will require a five-year drive starting now. Nor should there be very many components in any new drive for independence. The Yes movement won the hearts and minds of around half a million people who had not intended to vote for independence when the campaign started. More than 20 months later it has managed to keep them all on board. The key to winning the extra 150,000 or so required to win a second referendum will be found in its ability to establish an unassailable position on currency and to command the debate on income and expenditure. This doesn’t require a grandiloquent “summer drive”; it requires long hours, diligence and rigorous testing and re-testing of the numbers.

The summer drive for independence, if it is to be regarded seriously, must also not be confined to SNP party strategists and activists. One of the fatal errors of the White Paper on Independence is that it was authored exclusively by a very tight circle of SNP people which was lamentably unrepresentative of the Yes movement as a whole.

The Greens have already shown how prickly they can be by their posturing on the formality of re-electing Ms Sturgeon as First Minister. They had every right to be though. If I had been their leader I would have been lobbying long before now for a representative at cabinet level in the event of a decent election showing.

So as the month of May makes way for the beginning of summer we have little idea of how the cause of Scottish independence is to be advanced in the coming months. I fear the First Minister is hoping merely that the summer drive will quieten some dissension in the ranks. If so, she is badly mistaken.

Two activists I spoke to this week, who each took a fortnight’s unpaid leave from their jobs to campaign morning, noon and night prior to the Holyrood election reported signs of impatience on Nationalist doorsteps. They expressed a fear that the entire concept of independence risks falling victim to the fatal “out of sight, out of mind” syndrome.