In one of those old John Wayne films, his character – a hard-bitten, Indian-fighting cavalry captain called Nathan Brittles – always counsels his subalterns to “Never apologise… it’s a sign of weakness.” I don’t suppose Nicola Sturgeon is an aficionado of John Wayne, whether in cowboy pictures or anything else; he espouses the wrong kind of politics and lifestyle for her. 

However, that motto from She Wore A Yellow Ribbon is a perfect match for Scotland’s First Minister. It fits her down to the ground. As well as “never apologise”, we should also add “never change your mind… because you’re always right”. And “never, ever admit that you’re wrong… because that would be impossible”.

As MSPs prepared to go off for their official Christmas holiday – although they’ll be back at least once, probably by Zoom – there were a few who reckoned something had to give. After all, not one but two scientific analyses had decided that the omicron variant of Covid-19 seemed not to be a second coming of the Black Death. 

However, Ms Sturgeon not only stuck to her guns over the restrictions she’s imposing from Boxing Day onwards, but actually added a new level of sanction in the shape of a closure of every nightclub in the land for “at least” three weeks.

The good…

But wait a minute. Hadn’t she heard on the radio, read in the newspapers or saw on television all that good news that omicron ain’t so bad? Of course she had, and thought it “very encouraging”, but couldn’t help herself from adding: “That is all good but, where we are right now, we have to take care that we do not allow the much higher transmissibility of omicron to outweigh the benefits of, perhaps, its lower severity.

“We need to take care at this critical moment because, if we allow the spread of omicron to get too far ahead of us, even if it is significantly less severe, that is going to overwhelm us.”

Douglas Ross, the Scottish Tories’ leader, wanted to know why, when Boris Johnson had reduced the self-isolation period for people who test positive in England from 10 days to seven, the First Minister couldn’t do the same in Scotland.

The bad…

Oh no, or at least not yet, she replied, as doing what the Prime Minister had done risked inadvertently allowing the further spread of the virus. But she would think about it, while accepting that it might be weeks before she changed her mind.

To this, Mr Ross replied: “We understand the need for caution, but the current rules are not sustainable.” They were leading to a shortage of workers in vital services and were forcing whole families and households to self-isolate for 10 days, even if they have tested negative.

However, at the end of the day the issue appears to be, at least according to the First Minister, that she is duty bound to listen and act upon the advice of her Scottish experts, while the Prime Minister responds to what his UK advisers tell him. 

…and the ugly

But isn’t this one of the greater farces in the so-called “devolution settlement”? Namely, that Scotland remains part of the UK, but when its devolved government does not like what the UK experts are saying, it is allowed to defer instead to its Scottish advisers? Is it any wonder that most people don’t know who to believe?

As far as the changes went on Thursday, there was certainly no sign that Ms Sturgeon had planned to “uncancel Hogmanay” as one wag had suggested.

He was believed to be not the same man who was arrested after posting an “all round to Nicola’s on Hogmanay” message, complete with the First Minister’s home address, on social media. At least, I don’t think they’re one and the same.