Is Kate Forbes Scotland’s answer to Giorgia Meloni?

Scottish nationalists have always looked to Scandinavian countries as models of what a caring, social democratic Scotland would look like if only it could escape the clutches of Westminster. Not anymore. National populism, or what the left call the far-right, is on the march across the Nordic landscape. The Sweden Democrats, the True Finns and the Norway Progress party have shifted the centre of political gravity in those supposedly socialist small states. 

Even in Denmark – home of the left wing TV series Borgen, which Nicola Sturgeon liked to compare her administration to – the government is aggressively repatriating asylum seekers and reportedly bulldozing ‘non-western’ neighbourhoods

Of course, migration is less of an issue in Scotland, not least because there are so few migrants. Scotland is around 95 per cent white and precious few of the 700,000 net migrants that entered the UK last year will find their way north. But national populism is still making an impact north of the Border. Step