The National:

AS the official opposition at Holyrood and a subsidiary of the Tories ruling at Westminster, the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party has a broad range of policy priorities.

First and foremost, they want to maintain the Union. That’s a pretty obvious one.

But don’t be fooled – there is much more to them than that.

They’re also determined to stop independence, whatever it takes.

And then there’s slagging off politicians that campaign for independence. They love doing that too.

Understandably, then, the Scottish Tories get quite frustrated when opposition parties adopt a far more narrow-minded approach.

And the Scottish National Party, much to the annoyance of Scottish Conservatives, simply won’t drop their support for independence.

The most shambolic Westminster government in living memory is leading the country towards an exit from the EU which economic experts predict could put the country in recession, despite Scots voting overwhelmingly to reject it – and still the SNP won’t stop making the case for independence!

Now with arguably the least successful prime minister of all time set to resign, Scots face being ruled over by one of several right-wing candidates, almost all of whom have vowed to block a democratic referendum on independence. Yet Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP keep arguing that perhaps Scotland would be better off if governed from Holyrood instead of Westminster.

Scots Conservative MP John Lamont took to social media to voice his considerable frustration at the First Minister’s intransigence.

“Every single opportunity that Nicola Sturgeon can find, whether it’s a new prime minister, whether it’s something to do with Brexit, whether it’s a crisp packet opening, she will use it as an opportunity to call for another referendum,” he said.

“And she needs to get over it. She needs to accept that she lost the referendum in 2014 and move on.

“That’s what my constituents want her to do – they want her to focus on the NHS, schools, the transport system rather than obsessing about the constitution.”

It seems so furious were Lamont’s Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk constituents with the SNP’s governance that huge numbers of them voted for the SNP in the European elections – with just under 30% of voters in the Scottish Borders region, which covers much of Lamont’s constituency, backing the SNP.

While in Scotland as a whole, support for independence has risen to 49%, according to a recent YouGov poll for the Times Scotland.

Despite the Scottish Tories’ near-constant attacks on independence, judging by the Twitter responses, the message isn’t quite getting through…