THEY call them snapshots in time because that’s exactly what they are. Valid for the time in which the sampling is undertaken. However, political polls are meat and drink to the commentariat for whom optimism about the figures is often the mother of some very imaginative inventions.

More telling is looking at polling trends over the months, and these will find most Conservative supporters reluctant to come out from under the duvet. The latest graph suggests that six Westminster MPs could ­become none. Which would at least save the embarrassment of wondering where they go after the hapless Douglas Ross, whose ­indecision has so often proved final.

More interesting have been the assorted reactions of those scribes wedded to the Labour cause. They have taken variously to their publications or blogs to explain why polls which show an uptick in support for ­independence really mean that ­Labour is firmly on the comeback trail in Scotland.

One particular observation caught my beady eye: you may be a mite surprised to learn that many voters supported the ­Scottish National Party in “most recent ­elections”, “in spite of, rather than because of that party’s commitment to leaving the UK”.

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Well, full marks for originality. Who would have guessed that folks voted for an indy-supporting party despite the party in ­question wanting Scotland to be ­independent?

This mindset is what has got the ­Labour Party where it is in Scotland today; a ­perverse belief that the haemorrhage of ­support from the people’s party has ­nothing whatsoever to do with erstwhile Labour ­voters being ­scunnered by their party ­setting its face against even an independence ­referendum.

The briefest of glances at the latest ­social attitudes survey, beholden to no cause other than number crunching, suggests that 40% of Labour-inclined voters favour ­independence. A statistic which might give most party leaders pause for a wee rethink.

But no. The recent Labour conference, basking in the warm glow of widening ­polling between them and a UK ­Government busily engaged in trying to bind up its own self inflicted-wounds, took time out to ­assure ­attendees that no, nay, never would they have any truck or deal with the SNP, ­regardless of the result of the next UK General Election.

The rationale for this is twofold. They want to avoid any possible repeat of a Tory charge of “a coalition of chaos”, though heaven knows the Conservatives are ­hardly in a position to hurl charges of chaos at any other party right now.

More pertinently, they say they want to call the SNP’s bluff, assuming that the latter would never vote down a ­Labour ­administration and land us all with ­another Tory one.

An alternative scenario, of course, ­depending on the parliamentary ­arithmetic, is the SNP calling Starmer’s bluff. Wondering if he really would rather have another Conservative government than deal with a party with whom it has notionally more in common.

I say notionally, because the party led by Sir Keir, whilst undoubtedly more ­electable in England than in its previous incarnation, has actually become not so much a broad church as a different kind of sect.

You might have thought, were you of a left-of-centre persuasion, that when a new Home Secretary proved herself even more lacking in common compassion than her odious predecessor, the Labour instinct would be to leap to its feet in undisguised horror.

What other reaction could anyone have to a Home Secretary who has a ­favourite dream of a Telegraph front page ­celebrating her packing asylum seekers off to Africa in a taxpayer-funded plane? Yet, when Labour’s Rachel Reeves was ­questioned about this on the airwaves, what she ­deplored was the Tory failure to deport often enough.

If this is New New Labour, a lot of its Scottish supporters will recoil in ­justified disgust. Ms Reeves did say she only ­wanted those with no right to settle here to be booted out. Yet ask yourself: on what are those rights predicated? You will find nobody on the deportation list who ­arrives with a bulging wallet rather than on an ­inflatable dinghy.

Then there is tax. Labour has committed itself to maintaining the Tory tax cut on the basic rate. A costly commitment. And an indication that the party has ceased to see taxation as a necessary investment in public services rather than the state ­picking our pockets.

Those countries which have better ­public services than us – no shortage at the moment – have higher tax rates. It’s how it works. Surely the most equitable way to protect the poorest is to raise the threshold at which they become liable to pay.

Plus, you will have noted that every time the very wealthy are threatened with higher rates, a posse of scribes will ­solemnly intone that there will be a ­massive flight from Scottish shores.

The predicted exodus never actually materialises, because when they do a cost-benefit analysis of living here, they generally work out that their migration south would prove an expensive business. Not least if they wanted their weans to go to yooni. In any case, decent citizens should not be hostile to the common good, ­regardless of their own circumstances.

This new model Labour Party is also keen to hang on to Trident, most ­especially because it doesn’t want to ­antagonise ­voters in those parts of England mooted as a likely alternative base. Hilariously, this is often dressed up as a desire not to have dangerous weaponry deployed too near highly populated towns. Glasgow anyone?

However, the most pressing argument of all for Labour voters not returning to the fold is their setting their face against what any reasonable observer would characterise as basic democracy. English and Scottish Labour leaders have echoed their Tory counterparts in saying they would never countenance a referendum.

People rightly point out the ­complexity and dangers of trying to posit a General Election as a de facto referendum or ­plebiscite.

They rarely contextualise this by ­mentioning that backstop was created precisely because of the blanket refusal to agree to a referendum.

I’m guessing this has rather more to do with worrying about losing one than ­preserving “this precious Union”.

It is clear from both Tory and Labour posturing, that any pretence has been ditched about this resembling a partnership, being voluntary, or any arrangement which could be dismantled whenever one of the component parts wishes to take a different path.

THE irony of all of this is that Labour pronounces itself wholly in favour of self-determination. It lauds any nation’s ambition to choose its own future and form of governance. Provided it’s not called Scotland.

It has been drip-feeding news of its much-vaunted constitutional reforms ­being authored by Gordon Brown and his colleagues.

We learn that a prominent one will be the abolition or a complete ­rethinking of the House of Lords. Happily, much ­research is available to help them along, since this proposal has long since ­celebrated its hundredth birthday.

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The bottom line is that Labour just doesn’t get it. Doesn’t get Scotland. Doesn’t begin to recognise how offensive it is to have a party which boasts one whole MP tell Scotland what it will and will not allow should it win power at the next election.

I shall not be remotely sorry to see ­Labour win power from the Tories, who are a mean-spirited shambles right now. I find I can live with some equanimity with the thought of the Scottish Tory leader and absurdly irrelevant Secretary of State finding their seats wheeched from under them.

Like many Scots, however, I’m not in the market for trading in one set of overlords for another.

Nor am I in the market for an economy based on being graciously ­granted pocket money from my own taxes.