NICOLA Sturgeon’s politics have always been about calculation. Her guiding star is the next day’s headline, which has served her well even if few are ever delivered on.

I very much doubt if her claim to “detest the Tories” arose out of either inadvertence or conviction. Rather, it was just another piece of positioning in the certainty it would turn a humdrum interview into a diversionary controversy.

Anxious calculations about whether it is wise to deepen divisions by categorising a quarter of the Scottish electorate as detestable are for weaker constitutions than Ms Sturgeon’s. There’s always room for subsequent caveats about meaning the policies, not the people. Then onto the next day’s headline.

Of course, Suella Braverman’s “dream” of putting people on planes to Rwanda is repugnant. But it is as repugnant in the eyes of decent people in Liverpool and London as to anyone of like mind in Scotland. It scarcely makes a case for separating us from them. Only in Ms Sturgeon’s narrow politics is it necessary to conflate the two.

The issue on which Ms Sturgeon speaks with passion is not a priority for two-thirds of Scottish voters who have no wish to see another referendum any time soon. Many who vote for her are happy to put it on hold. Yet within her limited purview, “Scottish democracy” depends on it.

That is a deception. When Scottish democracy had the clearest possible opportunity to express itself, the verdict was decisive and it did not go Ms Sturgeon’s way. She could not accept that. The only “Scottish democracy” she will applaud is one which surrenders to her objective and meanwhile everything else remains secondary, to Scotland’s cost.

Scotland – as opposed to her own hard core – is not crying out for the referendum which Ms Sturgeon demands. So what else do they have to offer? On the evidence of the past few days, the answer is “not very much” – and least of all open debate on critical areas of policy, affecting daily life, where Scotland has been failed by her administration.

I could have sworn the fabled manifesto promised to “close the attainment gap”, rather than widen it. And remind me what it said about NHS waiting times… so was there only one manifesto “commitment” that matters – i.e. the one that is not within their gift to deliver?

In truth there are two prospects that could threaten the SNP’s hegemony and neither of them is a Tory government, the maintenance of which remains their most reliable ally. The first is the possibility that Labour’s position will improve because there is a real prospect of a Labour government for the whole UK.

Within Ms Sturgeon’s 40 per cent, a significant number might be persuaded that the priority is to change the government within two years, rather than await an exceptionally hypothetical promised land in the event not only of a referendum happening but of it producing a different result from the last one.

Confirmation of what the SNP fears was provided by the amount of time spent by its leadership on attacking the Labour Party which is not in government at Westminster nor even the principal opposition at Holyrood. Why? Because they rely so heavily on the gross misrepresentation of what Labour governments have delivered in the past and would deliver again. And what happens then to their sole objective?

It started with Keith Brown, who is apparently Ms Sturgeon's deputy. “Keir Starmer is just another Tony Blair,” he raged. I’m not sure this is a great line of argument since, among much else, the Blair government introduced a National Minimum Wage, slashed child poverty, properly funded the NHS and council services and created a Scottish Parliament.

When Mr Brown or the equally bellicose Ian Blackford, who railed against a “Brexit-backing, democracy-denying, Tory-enabling Labour Party” can match a fraction of that record, they might have a complaint. The past 15 years have not given them much to go on.

To Ms Sturgeon yesterday, opposing the break-up of Britain means being “complicit with the Tories”. To me, it means solidarity with similar social and economic interests in every corner of the state we live in. That gap in perceptions is unbridgeable.

Brexit may have been a foolish piece of self-harm but so is wasting years on pretending it could be reversed. The best nationalism can offer is the prospect of a hard border within our small island between Scotland within the EU (improbable) and the UK outside the EU (certain). Angus Robertson’s traffic police marshalling border tail-backs would be busy while the price of division would be high.

As for the Tories, they pose the second threat to the SNP in the form of a bad example. People have seen what happens when one-dimensional politicians play fast and loose with the basic rules of running an economy. They didn’t like it from Truss and Kwarteng. They wouldn’t risk it with Sturgeon and Swinney.

It's fine for the First Minister to make capital from the security of pensions and benefits having been brought to the brink by the follies of a Tory government. What she didn’t mention was the £64 billion intervention by the Bank of England which pulled things back to relative safety. What currency would a Scottish bail-out be in? On economics, Sturgeon matches Truss in vacuity.

The lesson of recent weeks is that anyone who opposes the Tories should be focused on getting rid of them at the earliest opportunity. That will not be achieved through endless play-acting about a second referendum or pretending that an election will be a surrogate vote on a subject of Ms Sturgeon’s choosing.

Throughout Britain, it will be about whether enough people want a change of government and a completely different moral compass about the priorities on which it operates. Ms Sturgeon may claim to detest the Tories but she also needs them in order to maintain vilification of the constitutional status quo.

Claiming to detest an opponent is easy. Defeating them is more relevant.

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