LABOUR’S Scottish conference has discovered that the party has a soul after all, and voted against the renewal of Trident, which also had the effect of making Labour the first quantum party in the UK. Immediately after Labour in Scotland decided it was against Trident, the party’s defence spokesperson Maria Eagle reminded them that defence is a reserved matter and Labour is in favour of renewing Trident so shut up, sit down, and get back into your radioactive shortbread tin. Scotland’s MSPs voted overwhelmingly to oppose Trident renewal. Our MPs are likewise overwhelmingly opposed to Trident renewal. But we’ll get Trident renewal anyway.

Maria represents Labour’s quantum of soul loss, and Labour is now simultaneously against renewing Trident and in favour of it. It’s a bit like Schroedinger’s cat, which was famously either alive or dead at the same time, only in Labour’s case we know that the cat is definitely dead and definitely not bouncing like Tigger.

Although the party’s policy on Trident is far from certain, it’s pretty certain that whatever Scotland wants and what her elected representatives vote for will have as much effect on the outcome as a protestor outside the Tory party conference. Because that’s what Scotland’s place is in the UK, an entire nation reduced to holding a placard outside a meeting we’re not invited to and to which we are not welcome. Maria Eagle thanked Labour in Scotland for their input into the debate, but made it clear that the decision was not going to be made in the country which must play host to the weapons. Trident isn’t based on Maria’s doorstep, it’s based on yours and mine.

Just about the only thing less certain than Labour’s actual policy on Trident is how many jobs depend on the UK’s nukes. During a Commons debate in February 2005, Geoff Hoon, then Secretary of State for Defence, said that there were 966 Scottish jobs which depend on Trident directly or indirectly.

A few years later and following a freedom of information request, the MoD said it was 520 civilian jobs. Jackie Baillie, Labour MSP for Dumbarton says that 13,000 jobs depend on Trident, although last year she said it was 11,000. Jackie hasn’t explained where the extra jobs have come from, but clearly she’s a woman who thinks mass destruction is a job creation scheme. It certainly is for politicians, although it won’t save Jackie’s job during the Scottish elections next year.

Jackie ought to be working for Iain Duncan Smith’s Department of Work and Pensions, which likewise thinks that creating devastation is good for a person’s employment prospects. If you think a weapon of mass destruction’s a job creation scheme then you probably think that demolishing a house is the best way to redecorate the living room.

Jackie Baillie voted with the Tories in favour of Trident renewal. The vote in Scotland doesn’t matter, said Jackie, making a case for independence without realising it. Jackie hasn’t understood that no one is proposing to close Faslane down. The SNP want the base as the HQ of a Scottish navy, Labour wants to diversify the defence industry and repurpose the facilities – a measure the SNP supports as long as Scotland remains in the UK. So all of Jackie’s protests were hot air based on a misunderstanding, which is also a good summary of her career to date.

LABOUR’S Trident policy has more kinks than Davie Cameron on a pig farm, and as if that wasn’t bad enough, Labour-controlled Glesca Cooncil has apparently decided that its own party is a terrorist threat.

Earlier this week it was revealed that the cooncil recently held a Protect Against Terrorism training course for its staff, during which anti-nuclear campaigners were identified as a potential terrorist threat. You’d think that a weapon capable of evaporating the Clyde basin might be the real threat, but the cooncil isn’t too bothered about the risk of the city being flattened by a nuclear explosion at Faslane as this would provide opportunities for lots of property developers. Glesca cooncil thinks the really dangerous risk to the well-being of society is a wee pensioner giving out CND leaflets. Although admittedly there is a risk of paper cuts. On the other hand, there’s an even higher risk of Glesca Cooncil being a threat to common sense and human decency.

During the independence referendum campaign the argument was frequently aired that Scotland couldn’t get rid of Trident and still be a member of Nato. It’s nice to see that Labour has now acknowledged that its former argument isn’t true. It’s not true and was never true, and moreover can be demonstrated to be untrue, although our Unionist media neglected to point it out at the time.

There’s another country which got rid of nukes and submarines and then went on to join Nato. Spain once hosted US Polaris nukes and submarines at the US naval base at Rota near Cadiz, but in the late 1970s as Spain transitioned to democracy following the death of the dictator Franco, the country negotiated with the USA for the missiles to be removed. The missiles went within two years, and when Spain completed its democratisation process, the country joined Nato – despite the pre-election pledge of the government of Felipe Gonzalez that Spain would remain neutral.

Irrespective of your views on Nato membership, the only surprising thing about the argument that we can’t get rid of Trident as it’s not compatible with Nato membership is that the argument still gets airtime. If ever you do see the argument in print or on the telly again, you can sit back in the knowledge that the only thing it does mean is that those concerned haven’t done their research.

Labour’s position on Trident is as confused as Jackie Baillie with a teach-yourself-arithmetic book. So let’s make it simple. Essentially the party’s position on Trident can be boiled down to the following – we want to be a part of the UK but we don’t want UK policy to apply to Scotland because the SNP are bad and it’s all their fault. Actually, that’s pretty much Labour in Scotland’s policy on everything.