Its leader may have resigned just months before a general election, but the Scottish Labour party is totally certain that everything is fine at the moment.

"We've never been stronger," Highland councillor John Ford said just days after leader Johann Lamont resigned, blaming "dinosaurs" from the UK Labour party for treating Scotland as a "branch office".

"The Labour party is not in a meltdown at all," Ford continued. "We've just lost a leader, but I think she was pretty tired out. She did the best thing she can do and have a rest."

He said talk of Ed Miliband dominating the Scottish Labour party is just "newspaper twattle", and praised Lamont.

"I think Johann did a good job in general," he said. "I didn't choose her, I thought there were better candidates. I can't remember who I voted for now. It was a man, not a woman. But I was very pleasantly surprised that Johann did a good job."

Hanzala Malik, Labour MSP, assured BuzzFeed News that the Scottish Labour Party is not in meltdown. "The Scottish Labour Party is not an ice lolly so we're not melting anywhere," he said.

Malik added that he doesn't think Miliband is an overbearing influence on Scottish Labour: "I think there needs to be a certain amount of interference anyway because we are a national organisation, not a local organisation. We're not a small party like the SNP."