Full disclosure: one of the people I’m writing about today is Patrick Harvie which means I may struggle here and there because I’ve generally found that Patrick Harvie’s opposition to something is one of the surest ways to prove it’s a jolly good idea. Brian Souter also plays a part today and I have some personal beef with him which I’ll tell you about. And to top it all, the third man involved is Humza Yousaf. What a bunch. Brace yourselves.

To summarise: according to papers obtained by the news website Politico, the SNP has been trying to re-establish a relationship with Sir Brian, who is the co-founder of Stagecoach and an evangelical Christian. Aides to Mr Yousaf apparently asked Sir Brian to help arrange a slap-up dinner aimed at repairing relations with Scottish business leaders and it’s been suggested Patrick Harvie and the Greens aren’t too happy about it.

However, it’s the weeds of the story that are really interesting because they go back a long way. Sir Brian has always been a supporter of Scottish independence but, as Mrs Merton might ask: what first attracted the SNP to the multi-millionaire Brian Souter? For years, he scooped piles of cash into the party – more than £2.5m from 2007 – before it came to an end when Nicola Sturgeon took over.

Sir Brian has never said publicly why he stopped donating to the party, but famously Nicola Sturgeon is a supporter of LGBTQIA rights while Sir Brian spent more of his money (a million this time, back in 2000) on a campaign to stop the Scottish Government abolishing Section 28. In other words, Sturgeon and Souter may both yearn for Scotland to be free, but they are unlikely to be simpatico on other stuff.

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Sir Brian’s campaign in 2000 is also the reason I have some beef with him. At the time, I was working for The Daily Record which declared its support for Sir Brian and printed stories day after day about how right he was while suppressing alternative arguments. The paper also resorted to familiar arguments about the danger to children and suggested the democratic process had been rigged by the “gay lobby”. It was not a good feeling to be working for a media organisation that was being unduly influenced by someone like Brian Souter.

But even though Keep the Clause was hideous, I still don’t understand why Mr Yousaf is facing criticism for trying to establish a working relationship with Sir Brian. We know the reality that may be motivating the First Minister : there’s been a collapse in donations to the SNP, membership has been falling, and the party needs cash and one thing Sir Brian has a lot of is cash. So as party leader, it makes sense.

The idea that Mr Yousaf shouldn’t be talking to Sir Brian also seems to be rather revealing about modern politics and public discourse. The Scottish Greens have so far refused to comment on the Souter stories (translation: they’re furious) and Mr Harvie has said in the past that the SNP should have nothing to do with the Stagecoach founder. In fact, Mr Harvie said it was Sir Brian’s Keep the Clause campaign that inspired him to get involved in politics in the first place. Great: another reason to dislike Brian Souter.

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But the notion, which the Greens appear to support, that the SNP should avoid Sir Brian makes no political sense. Mr Yousaf and Sir Brian may disagree on LGBTQIA issues, who knows, but one of the motivations of the dinner Sir Brian organised was to improve relations between the SNP and business leaders and not only is that a responsible thing to do, it involves sitting down for your three courses plus wine with people who don’t necessarily share the same opinions as you, and that’s a good thing. Politics cannot, and should not, involve conversations only with people you agree with.

It strikes me that one of the problems with the Greens in particular, but a lot of modern activism in general, is they don’t really get this and cannot tolerate people with “wrong” views. It’s why the Greens have expelled members who disagree with the party’s trans policies and it’s why they’re fuming about their government partners having dinner with Christians who don’t support gay marriage. I don’t like Sir Brian’s views either. But in government, more important factors sometimes take precedence.

You may think I’m being naïve here and that Yousaf and Souter is all about money. You may also wonder how socially liberal Mr Yousaf is really, despite him trying to contrast himself with Kate Forbes. But what we shouldn’t do is pretend politics can operate in a world in which we’ve finally found what's right and wrong and should only speak to the people who are right. That would be to infantilise us all and deny the political reality we must accept. Some people disagree with you. Get over it.