We pondered long and hard over how best to analyse Scottish Labour’s bewildering, oh-my-God-they’re-really-calling-it-that “Vow Plus” fiasco from yesterday, readers.

We contemplated noting the absurdity of Gordon Brown being its frontman when he’s not standing in May and won’t be in Parliament to deliver it. We considered a forensic deconstruction showing how it’s just the same old reheated, uncosted rubbish they’ve been waffling around for the past years.

(“Give Holyrood control of housing benefit, separating it out from the rest of the UK’s Universal Credit by mumble mumble! Increase pensions using the extra cash freed up by mumble mumble! Devolve workfare, which somehow magically ‘creates jobs’ by mumble mumble! Pretend we just said ‘1000 nurses’ all along, not the demented ‘1000 more than anything the SNP say’!”)

We thought about pointing out all the comical flapping the party’s done around its devolution proposals, presenting the weary and confused Scottish people with feeble, grudging, underwhelming plan after feeble, grudging, underwhelming plan – at least five different ones since 2009 – and resentfully upping the offer by the bare minimum they think they can get away with every time.

And we wondered if it was worth drawing attention to the fact that the latest effort is actually basically the Strathclyde Commission blueprint from the Conservatives with a red sticker hastily slapped on it.

But in the end, the truth is a lot simpler than that.

“Vow Plus” is designed to persuade people into voting Labour, but it’s a singularly useless device for achieving that aim, for one blindingly obvious reason:

Whatever Labour are prepared to offer now, it stands to reason that they’d also be prepared to concede the same, at a minimum, in return for SNP backing at Westminster if they needed it.

Think about it. Instead of voting Labour, people could vote SNP and get all the same things and more. Labour could hardly turn around in negotiations and say “Look, we’re taking our own proposals off the table”, but a large block of SNP MPs could demand others, or rule out those they thought would be to Scotland’s detriment.

For the large percentage of the electorate that wants more powers for Holyrood, an SNP vote is a no-lose vote. If they’re dependent on SNP support, Labour’s manifesto is basically a starting position. If Labour get a Commons majority by themselves, they can backtrack on as much of it as they like.

We already know that an SNP vote can’t let the Tories in. So absolutely nothing’s changed about the position as it stood before “Vow Plus”. Scots can still either help Labour win in the UK – at which point Labour can safely ignore Scotland in order not to outrage the English – or they can elect a large block of non-Labour MPs who can effectively hold Westminster to ransom and defend Scottish interests.

The details of “Vow Plus” are a complete red herring. Whatever’s in it can be delivered whether Scots votes Labour or SNP, and the latter guarantees it much more surely than the former. Scotland simply doesn’t need Labour MPs. It can either put its trust in Ed Miliband, or it can give itself some insurance.