Indyref2 could be the biggest headache of Boris’s premiership

Nicola Sturgeon is the only opposition leader who survived the general election. She has emerged far stronger. The Tories had hoped to halt the nationalists’ advance, but in the end, Scotland was the only part of the UK in which their party suffered serious setbacks. Sturgeon’s advancing army dethroned Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson, claimed seven of the 13 Scottish Tory seats and took 48 of Scotland’s 59 MPs. The First Minister’s message now is pretty clear: she is the only politician who can stand up to the Bullingdon boy, and the battle for the Union is back on.

Within hours of the result, Sturgeon declared that the SNP surge ‘renews, reinforces and strengthens’ her case for another independence referendum. She has rarely been off the airwaves since. There are plans afoot for a Scottish government document setting out the case for a vote, with a request for a ‘Section 30’ order to follow.