MY dear brothers and sisters, we are gathered here together to express our sorrow at the passing of the deceased, our late and dearly beloved Labour Party in Scotland. For the best part of the lives of most of us this great institution was a force for great good.

But long before its final agonies, it was evident to many of us that it had ceased to perform the most basic functions. And when the life support machine that had artificially maintained it these past few years was finally switched off it came as a relief to those who had been forced lately to witness its sad decline in body and soul.

The end, when it came, was swift and relatively painless: just a few simple last words by its leader in Scotland, Kezia Dugdale, to indicate that it was time to go: “Another referendum would do irreparable damage to the very fabric of communities across Scotland.”

In uttering these words Ms Dugdale was borrowing yet another discredited Conservative Party mantra. Yet again, it showed that our dearly departed friend had lost touch with reality; that it had failed to observe the energy and vibrancy that had flowed through some of Scotland’s poorest communities during the first independence referendum.

These communities, as many here will attest, had been among the most fervent and passionate friends of the deceased but had felt betrayed by its inability to protect them from the worst excesses of the free market.

Of course, being a close friend of the deceased, we could perfectly understand the terrifying dilemma that led to its ultimate breakdown. In the latter years of its life, having been gripped by that illness that affects better judgment and leads to a loss of self-awareness, it had begun to develop the bad habits that would consume it.

Ultimately, it had led to paralysis of brain and limb which was distressing to those who had shared its triumphs and tribulations along the way. Many of us were grateful that our own dearly departed relatives had not survived to witness these sad days.

Its leadership had begun to exhibit a deeply unhealthy hatred of Scottish Nationalism which affected its judgment and soon found it wandering into the eager clutches of the Conservative and Unionist Party.

It turned on those many thousands of its supporters who saw an opportunity to build a new independent Scotland underpinned by ideas of social justice.

These people had wanted to vote Yes but remain within the Labour Party. Instead, they were hounded out and have never returned.

Without wanting to stretch the point, my dear brothers and sisters, the late departed Labour Party in Scotland had begun to keep bad company. During the referendum campaign when it ought to have been diligent in steering a careful course built on social justice and fairness, it instead chose to be seduced by rich Tory chancers who insinuated themselves into its favours and led them into clubs full of disreputable and wasted aristocrats.

Long after its bedtime it was to be found wandering the streets singing Rule Britannia and shouting about British values. On another infamous occasion it was even to be found talking about “British jobs for British workers.”

Its leaders and senior members began to collect baubles and trinkets faster than you could say: “Awake ye starvlings from your slumbers.”

Many are now to be found slumbering away in ermine on the leather seats of Westminster’s upper chamber or advising the UK’s richest people about how to hang on to their fortunes and no questions asked.

But let us not dwell overlong on the empty blandishments and low attractions that led finally to its decline. Instead, let us remember all the good things about the life of our fallen friend.

After all, as another flawed hero once said: “The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred in their bones.” The Labour Party’s achievements and compassion will linger in our memories far longer than the shallow adventurism and false caprices of its wretched latter years.

Most of us gathered here today will go forth from this place in our smart suits to toast the deceased in upmarket wine bars and sip cocktails. Then we will retire to our Chardonnay estates to plan our next holiday abroad or pore over the budgets set aside for our children’s education.

We will all too easily forget that we were gifted our soft lifestyles by the sacrifices of another generation and the campaigning of our dear friend, the Labour Party.

The right to good health, a good education, decent housing, a properly-paid job and employment protection were all bequeathed to us by Labour. It alone stood up for ordinary working men and women and ensured that they could share in the wealth of our nation: a wealth that many had fought to protect with their lives in two world wars.

During those decades of social change, when this country was forced to govern for the many rather than the few, the Conservative Party did its worst to unstitch every reform that benefited ordinary working people.

Lately though, Britain’s extreme right has established control of the Conservative Party and the politics of fear and suspicion of foreigners has begun to take root once more. The UK Labour Party has been unable to resist the forces of reactionary populism.

North of the Border, its traditional friends and supporters looked to the Labour Party in Scotland to be more aggressive in countering this. Sadly though, maladies and diseases such as careerism, managerialism and over-exposure to wealth and influence had begun to quicken.

When the first independence referendum in 2014 gave Scots the opportunity to plot a different, more compassionate and kinder course, Scottish Labour chose the wrong side.

Even then, the more optimistic among us hoped that a remedy could be found and that our beloved old friend would revive, rise from its sick-bed and fight the SNP toe-to-toe by holding it to account on bringing about social justice and reducing inequality.

Our optimism, dear friends and colleagues, was a cruel chimera. Instead, Scottish Labour, impoverished and deluded, chose to become champions of a union with a country that lately has failed to acknowledge that Scotland even existed.

In doing so, it allied itself to militarism and obscene expenditure on nuclear weapons.

So, with sorrow in our hearts, we say farewell to our beloved old friend and consign its body to the ground. We will remember its great achievements and drink a toast to them tonight.

And we will try to forget the sad sight of what it had become – a wretched facsimile of the Conservative and Unionist party whose wily stratagems and deceits our mothers and fathers had fought all of their lives to resist.

Please be upstanding as the organist plays Nimrod from Elgar’s Enigma Variations.