‘WHICH political party was the most successful in the UK in the past 25 years?” someone recently asked a group of us who had met to discuss the politics of the 2024 UK election.

The conventional answers to the above would normally be the Tory Party, the SNP – or maybe Welsh Labour (unbeaten since 1922). The answer the speaker gave was Ukip.

The logic is that Ukip may have never won a single Westminster seat at a UK General Election, but they turned politics upside down. Not only achieving their ultimate goal of the UK leaving the EU, their influence continues to shape Tory thinking and behaviour.

This raises questions about how you do politics, push narratives and frame debates (and ultimately bring about change) – and how “success” is defined.

Mostly forgotten now, before Brexit, there was Euroscepticism. This constantly ate away at the EU project, eventually hardening into Brexit and then the fantasy, purist version we see today.

This brings us to the state of UK politics and Keir Starmer’s Labour. As every day passes it looks more likely that the Tories will lose the next Westminster election.

There are still big obstacles for Labour to climb: the Tories won an 80-seat majority last time (their biggest since 1987); and Labour need to win 124 seats minimum for a majority of one (which they have only done in 1945 and 1997).

What is clear is that a political and ideological era is coming to an end. Tory dominance of the past 13 years – and the right-wing narrative of inequality, privatisation and starving the public realm that has caused so much damage to society – is on the wane.

The agenda of Starmer’s Labour is a limited one considering the scale of the economic, social and democratic crisis the UK faces.

The leadership logic is to give little opportunity for attack areas to the Tories – whether the economy, public spending, Brexit, immigration or so-called “culture wars.”

Labour has however promised bold, dramatic action in a few policy areas.

One was the Green New Deal which intended to offer £28 billion a year in public investment to create new green jobs and infrastructure, and to attempt to begin to match the ambition of the US and EU.

The second was the Brown Devolution Commission, which proposed sweeping reform to English governance, including replacing the House of Lords with a senate of the nations and regions.

When I met a group of senior Labour figures a couple of months ago they were honest about the scale of challenges a Starmer premiership would most likely face, anxious about the command and control leadership, but still felt that in the words of one Labour insider that “there were openings for transformative change in the Green New Deal and Brown Commission.”

Such voices are less optimistic today.

The Green New Deal has been scaled back and brought under Treasury orthodoxy: all so that Labour can insulate itself against Tory attacks of increased borrowing.

Meanwhile, the Brown Commission was never championed and fully embraced by the Starmer leadership; House of Lords reform has been relegated into a second term of a Labour government, meaning that the can has been kicked down the road.

Labour now stands not only against radical politics but increasingly against pluralism.

Not only will Labour not embrace proportional representation – despite Labour Conference voting for it – they are vehemently against coalition and co-operation with other parties in government in Westminster.

Underlining this, last week the party moved to expel Neal Lawson, head of the campaigning group Compass, after 44 years in Labour.

His crime? Arguing for cross-party co-operation and a politics of pluralism. There is a warning and opportunity in this.

Pro-indy supporters cannot continually say there is no difference between Labour and Tories and that the former are nothing but “Red Tories”. Despite all of the above.

First, there is a high degree of cross-over between Labour and SNP voters. There is not, as some independence supporters think, a non-porous divide between the two camps of pro-independence and pro-Union.

POST-2014, a large section of Labour voters switched to the SNP – many of whom were pro-independence.

Now we know from numerous polls that some voters are shifting from the SNP to Labour – and in part, some of this change is from people who first switched to the SNP post-2014.

Several surveys have shown support for independence remaining firm as support for the SNP slips and as this does, the Labour vote is rising among those who are pro-independence.

Second, this trend could be described as a shift from “Labour for independence” in 2014 to “Independence for Labour” in the coming UK election.

This critical group of swing voters is one of the most decisive in party politics, and in the future prospects and shape of independence. They need to be understood, not caricatured.

Third, Labour’s message for 2024 in Scotland is “vote Labour as the simplest, easiest way to get rid of the Tories”.

It has a logic, traction and cut-through, and is fine-tuned to play well with the swing voters above. It has the prospect of having as much (if not more reach) than that of posing the election as a “de facto referendum” on independence.

This latter pitch is the politics of process and cannot actually deliver what it is promising, whereas the Labour message can.

Fourth, politics is part perception, part fact. Labour were once the dominant party of Scotland; now it is the SNP. No era lasts forever.

Next year’s UK election will be a competitive contest in Scotland. Labour will make gains, as they will in England and Wales.

Some of this in Scotland will come from the SNP. And whether the SNP ends up as the largest party in seats and votes – or Labour does, the election will be spun as a reverse for the SNP.

All political eras have their cycles and dynamics. The Tory age of dominance is coming to an end.

As is the era of right-wing voodoo economics and zombie capitalism which has unleashed such havoc, turning society upside down and tearing up the social contract between government and citizens.

Independence has to understand this canvas and the forces of change, and position itself as a passionate advocate for breaking with the economic and social orthodoxies of recent times.

This means recognising the shift towards Labour across the UK and the reality that this is a watershed moment while acknowledging the limited nature of Starmer’s agenda – and making common cause with Labour radicals and progressives, as well as those of other and no party across the UK.

This brings us back to that question posed at the outset – what is success for a political party and wider movement? For some in the former it is merely winning elections – that being something the Tories across the UK have been historically good at, as have the SNP recently in Scotland.

Politics is about more than that.

It is about ideas, reframing debates, and seeking, and making, long-term fundamental change. If there are any lessons for independence in the politics of Brexit they are (apart from avoiding the stench of dogmatic, xenophobic, little Englander mindsets) to think long-term and strategically.

Independence has already changed the nature of Scottish politics, but it cannot afford to stand still celebrating “the summer of 2014.” Instead, it has to keep moving, adapting and changing to the political environment.

The rising tide of UK Labour and the descent of the Tories is one such major change; as is the state of the SNP after 16 years in office.

The party will face difficult contests in 2024 and 2026. Such a landscape will challenge some in Scotland who saw independence as a natural wave from the “Big Bang” of 2014 and Brexit of 2016.

For those who want a politics that is more honest, that is trying to come to terms with the big issues which define so much of how we live and that is addressing fundamental shifts economically, technologically and ideologically, the above is an opportunity.

Independence can never stay still and be synonymous with the status quo. It has to be about change and disruption.