To understand what‘s happening it’s instructive to look at where Labour really seems to be in deep trouble, for the time being anyway. This is in Scotland, not the north of England. Since the referendum when the Labour Party campaigned for the Union in alliance with the Tories and the Liberal Democrats, it has apparently been bleeding to death. Startling opinion polls threaten it with the loss of all but a handful of its 40 Scottish seats. If they are to be believed, voters are fleeing Labour in flocks, especially in working-class constituencies in Glasgow and Lanarkshire. But these defectors are not rushing to join Nigel Farage‘s merry band; they have no interest in Ukip. On the contrary they are turning to the SNP, a middle-class party now led by a generation of Glasgow University graduates. The SNP’s new leadership is composed of the sort of people who helped keep Scottish Labour on the rails while the Labour Party lost its nerve and cohesion in England during the Thatcher years: middle-class, middle of the road, sensible pragmatists like John Smith, Donald Dewar and George Robertson.