EX-LABOUR MP Tom Harris has given further evidence, as if further evidence was required, of the interchangeability of the Conservatives and the uber-Unionist faction of the Labour Party in Scotland. Both are united in their arrogance and in their belief that British nationalist political parties are immune from democratic norms and don't have to respect the outcome of votes in Scotland where the electorate has delivered a result that is not to their liking.

Having been resoundingly rejected by voters in his former constituency of Glasgow South in the Westminster General Election of 2015, Tom has apparently come to the conclusion that the real reason why the electorate of Scotland dethroned Labour from their former position of political dominance after allying with the Conservatives during the independence referendum campaign in 2014 is because Labour in Scotland have not been Tory enough. 

READ MORE: Former Labour MP Tom Harris takes on job in UK Government's Scotland Office

For this kind of political insight, Tom has now been rewarded with a post as an adviser to the Scotland Office where he can give the governor general Alister Jack advice on why the need to respect Scottish democracy ended the second that the result of the 2014 referendum was announced.

And there we were thinking that one of the core arguments of Tom's Vote Leave campaign for leaving the EU was so we could get rid of unelected and unaccountable political apparatchiks making our laws and influencing our public policy. He never told us that somewhere buried away in the small print of the case for Brexit it said, "except for former Glasgow Labour MPs called Tom who were rejected by the electorate of their former constituency. You're never going to remove them from positions of public responsibility."

Tom was the director of the Scottish branch of the Vote Leave campaign in support of Brexit, where he led such a successful campaign that almost two thirds of voters in Scotland opted to remain in the EU. He left Labour in 2018 because it wasn't right-wing and Brexity enough and announced that he'd be voting Conservative in the December 2019 Westminster General Election where, in Scotland, his party of choice lost more than half its seats and achieved a paltry 25% of the votes cast. He has continued to argue in support of Brexit since the 2016 referendum and the Scottish public has remained resolutely immune to his powers of persuasion. 

If nothing else, Tom has been consistent in backing the wrong political choice. If the Scotland Office is now relying on his advice for ways to shore up opposition to independence and fend off demands for another independence referendum, it's safe to say that Scottish independence is in the bag.

This piece is an extract from today's REAL Scottish Politics newsletter, which is emailed out at 7pm every weekday with a round-up of the day's top stories and exclusive analysis from the Wee Ginger Dug.

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