THE STORY SO FAR

I’VE been embedded as a Special Adviser at the heart of the Scottish Government on a top-secret assignment. My mission: to provide intelligence on the independence movement and to report to my handler, the mysterious master-spy “H” who serves as a minister in Nicola Sturgeon’s cabinet.

MONDAY

THE plot to stop Nicola Sturgeon using COP26 as a marketing tool for Scottish independence is underway. I’ve been asked by my handler to do all in my power to keep the First Minister away from Glasgow during the conference.

However, the Scottish Greens sitting in the cabinet already seem to be doing a grand job at derailing the entire process. Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater are single-handedly dismantling everything their supporters thought they stood for.

This week it’s been large scale waste incinerators. Last week it was downgrading work on a national energy firm. Is there anything this pair won’t do to keep their jobs and enhanced pensions safe?

Now, I hear reports that Harvie has been spotted out on one of those motor-powered bikes that chunky Glaswegians use when they want to appear all fit and sustainable. And Slater has been accused of putting her used Nespresso coffee pods in ordinary black bin bags … and not the little grey sustainable bags she should be using. Other miscreants have been known to do a forced fire-walk while doused in petrol for such negligence.

TUESDAY

THE revelation the other week that Murdo Fraser is actually a Nationalist super-spy working behind enemy lines came as no surprise. Whenever Sturgeon seems to be looking a bit shaky up would pop Murdo with some indefensible contumely to make the First Minister look like a towering international stateswoman.

His defence of the rioting Rangers fans after they laid waste to George Square was a masterclass in the art. According to Murdo, the chaps in Royal Blue were being boisterously good-humoured after winning 10 in a row until they were accosted by intolerant Saturday shoppers. Many of these so-called elderly lady shoppers were seen to be carrying suspiciously large bags of potatoes about their person. And certainly many more than your normal peace-loving Scot actually needs. “So there was obviously an agenda,” said Murdo.

Now I’m left to wonder if Douglas Ross might also be a top-secret Nat. Every time Squeaky opens his mouth I can actually see an imaginary counter registering thousands more Yes votes. Yesterday, he shifted his focus onto vaccine passports.

“These passports are crippling Scottish nightclubs and forcing responsible purveyors of sustainable cocaine underground where they could become dangerous. I propose instead a voluntary non-concupiscence affidavit signed by all club-goers on being granted ingress to these pillars of the night-time economy. Although obviously, we need to be alert for any people displaying gypsy-like tendencies like ringlets in their hair; inappropriate body piercings and body art.

“As long as they promise to abstain from sexual relations for a period of 48 hours after meeting in a club that would be sufficient to stop the spread of the virus. I’ve proposed a list of what might and might not be permissible and have asked Professor Linda Bauld to accompany me to a club of her choice to advise on appropriate degrees of intimacy for the Covid.”

WEDNESDAY

I’m summoned to meet “H” at our new meeting destination in the bottom floor of the Castle Terrace car park which lies at the more subdued end of Princes Street. “We’ve only got one month to prevent Sturgeon addressing the COP26 conference,” he tells me.

I’m still none the wiser as to the real identity of “H” but I notice that he seems inordinately fond of German labels, like the Overath & Haller gold wristwatch he’s currently sporting. “I think I’d like you to contact your old Tory boss at Westminster, David Cameron,” he says. “I’m told he’s now the middle-man for some dodgy PPE entrepreneurs.”

Of course! Dodgy Dave could be the man to sort this out. The plan would be to get Dave to source a truckload of extremely dodgy PCR testing kits which are all guaranteed to return a positive test result. And then it’s just a matter of creating a situation where the First Minister is forced to take a test on the eve of the COP26. And have our people to be on hand to test her with one of the snide kits. That would put her out of action for the entire 10 days of the conference.

THURSDAY

Disaster! Sir Keir Starmer has only gone and arranged for Gordon Brown to head up a special commission tasked with settling “the future of the Union”. Doesn’t he know that every time Big Grumpy exercises those Clyde Tunnel jaws of his about independence he actually makes me want to vote Yes?