As the dust settles on the arrest, tent, police raid, and tabloid search for a glimpse of Nicola Sturgeon or Peter Murrell, the Easter break has given everyone a chance to look around a bit.

For independence supporters the situation may look bleak, as even the SNP’s interim CEO Mike Russell says; “I don’t think independence can be secured right now; we need to work towards some co-ordinated campaigning” with a “new Yes movement.”

Independence is the life blood of the SNP, the reason members join and campaigners chap doors and distribute leaflets each election time. So, does that admission mean the SNP is terminally damaged? No – or at least not yet.

Support for independence is remarkably steady and a new, joint, concerted campaign might just appeal to Yessers, so long as it’s 100% genuine and speedily delivered. But more importantly, the SNP is still the only game in town for Scots who’ve given up on Westminster. And that’s a lot of people. Besides it isn’t the only party with problems.

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Saturday’s Tory-supporting Telegraph proclaimed “Tory fury as Douglas Ross says Scots should vote Labour to oust SNP” – a position party chairman Craig Hoy MSP implausibly denied his boss had actually taken on BBC Scotland’s Sunday Show.

Analysts predict the Tories are set for a drubbing in the English local elections and another Tory MP has been caught trying to sell his wares in a Times sting.

The Daily Mail columnist Richard “no friend to the Nats” Littlejohn has suggested 20 cops arriving for a dawn raid at the Sturgeon/Murrell home was over the top. Meanwhile, talk of a leadership re-run or a sub-party forming at Holyrood should be tempered by the fact of Kate Forbes’ daily tweets supporting Humza Yousaf. She may be playing a waiting game but internal opposition will find it hard to coalesce around an alternative leader who doesn’t challenge the newly elected incumbent.

Still, the SNP and Scottish Government face massive challenges – there’s no escaping the fact. It’s just that switching support to (probably) Labour means accepting a British state that shows no signs of being able to confront or reform itself. Au contraire.

You don’t need to be a card-carrying Republican to feel slightly nauseous as faux Coronation excitement ramps up daily. It seems we should suspend criticism of the million-pound event since community activists will replace z-list dignitaries at the event. Huzzah. We should be chuffed that in a cost-of-living crisis, King Charles has designed a “scaled down” event with just one new gold carriage and two new thrones which will last 90 minutes not the three hours spent on Queen Elizabeth’s ceremony in 1953.

Still, while the British and international press trills about the chance for a moment of coronation togetherness, Scotland stands with one eyebrow collectively arched.

Shetland is still the only council to vote against a bank holiday for staff on the May coronation weekend – happily, national holidays in Scotland are determined by councils. But in Westminster-run Northern Ireland, local elections have been postponed by two weeks to avoid a clash. Yip, a month after celebrations of the democratic breakthrough achieved by the Good Friday Agreement 25 years ago, local democracy must take second place to the coronation of an unelected head of state.

And bizarrely that’s quite unremarkable in an archaic British state half of Scotland would leave but most of Scotland would reform. A Panelbase poll in December 2022 found 55% of Scots would prefer an independent Scotland to be a republic rather than headed by King Charles – a result which aligns Scotland with Europe where 21 of 27 EU member states are republics with elected heads of state.

Even amongst the six European monarchies, Britain is an outlier – the only country still conducting an actual coronation ceremony. European monarchies have either replaced them with simpler events (like Denmark) or never practised coronations (like the Netherlands and Belgium). Indeed, most monarchies today just require a simple oath taken in the country’s legislature. But hey Britain – simple? That’s not what monarchy is about.

Rory Scothorne suggests the British royal family is not just regal eye-candy but “indicates to subjects that Britain is not like other states, and thus need not be held to similar standards. By proving we do things differently here, [the monarchy] helps us avoid the realisation that we actually do things worse. It is royalty, above all, that makes Britain’s conservative constitution popular.” Maybe, in England but not with Scots.

One month before C-Day, Scots have far fewer street parties planned than the rest of the UK – though of course, spontaneity might yet kick in. Still, last year only 14 events were held in Scotland to celebrate 70 years of the Queen on the throne. Across the UK, there were 16,000. When it comes to the cowed reverence and Union Jack emblazoned excitement that accompanies royalty, Scots tend to back the Bard: “The rank is but the guinea’s stamp, The Man’s the gowd for a’ that.”

The Panelbase poll did find 45% of Scots would keep the monarchy in an independent country, but I suspect they’d expect a seriously pared-down European-style monarchy – which clearly ain’t what “frugal” Charles is planning. This is just one part of the obsequious, foreluck-tugging reality Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour Party must tackle or meekly endorse. Which will it be?

We already know the answer. Ditto with all the other big issues. What chance a return to full-blooded public ownership beyond railways that are already halfway there, and the bantamweight arrival of Great British Energy to compete on the sidelines while the billion pound profit-making BP and Shell rock on? None.

What chance of a return to the EU or at least the single market? None

What chance of an end to the ramped up anti-immigrant rhetoric that fuelled the recent attack on an asylum seeking hotel? Some, but the virility test for the Labour leader will be keeping the horrific Rwanda deportation route open and stopping more boats on the Channel.

Indeed, what chance vigorous, open debate on these and other vital issues while an unofficial policy of “wheesht for a Labour Government” is operating? Monica Lennon MSP admitted as much last week as she joined the chorus of criticism over Labour’s attack ads, signed off by Keir Starmer, which claim Rishi Sunak doesn’t think child sex abusers should go to prison. Until now wheeshting was only for indy. Actually, everyone does it.

Scotland is waiting to see what arises from Peter Murrell’s arrest. Clearly, Humza has it all to do. But so does everyone else who would unseat him.