A CLUTCH of core beliefs lies at the heart of the Labour Party’s sense of itself; of what it believes it was put on this earth to do. Occasionally, depending on the caprices and preferences of party leaders, other more ephemeral values can gain influence. The essential tenets, though, have never altered.

Two are inextricably linked: support for the rights of workers to be represented by a trade union and support for their right to a wage that will provide them and their families with a decent standard of living.

You might also throw in something about trying to avoid wars if you can possible help it and not spending a quantum of the public purse on weapons of mass destruction. That though seems to have become an elastic concept among Labour’s Westminster cohort at least.

An innate belief in the concept that all men and women were created equal and are entitled equally to a share of the state’s assets might be one. Another is that each person deserves an equal opportunity to realise his gifts and to protection under the law. It’s not a radical agenda but a fair one. In Scotland the recent vicissitudes of Labour have arisen mainly because many of its core supporters have found the party wanting on core beliefs. The extent of alienation may be a matter for debate but what cannot be denied is that many people feel alienated. Crucially, and unfortunately for the party, they arrived at this conclusion at around the same time. It’s why in the space of less than a decade the party went from being Scotland’s traditional party of government to a position of irrelevance.

It has had six leaders in that time and, with each new leadership contest, especially the most recent, you expected that the penny would drop and that a moment of clarity would occur. You found yourself hoping yet again that the new incumbent would tumble to the reality and catch up with the party’s lost generation of supporters. None got anywhere near it, though, and you were left wondering what was top of their agenda: advancing traditional Labour values or advancing personal ambitions.

The Herald:

Labour’s downward trajectory can be traced back to wrapping itself in the Union flag during the independence referendum. Voters, above, go to the polls on September 18, 2014.

Scottish Labour’s unhealthy obsession with decrying everything about the campaign for Scottish independence has been its single biggest folly.

This reached its nadir under the catastrophic leadership of Jim Murphy and coincided with the approach to the independence referendum. There had always existed a way of reasonably opposing Scottish independence by concentrating on our shared industrial heritage with the working classes of England’s great northern cities. Instead though, Labour chose to wrap itself in the Union flag and to disparage those of its own supporters who voted Yes.

The sight of many senior Labour figures and professional party apparatchiks cheering themselves hoarse and hugging Tories after the referendum will never be forgotten or forgiven by many former supporters.Sadly, this spirit has been allowed to pervade the strategy of Scottish Labour ever since. It is fuelled by an insane hatred (and I use that word advisedly) of the SNP.

The Conservative party, which alone ought to be regarded as the sworn enemy of Labour’s social aspirations, has exploited this. Only one party looks comfortable in the colours of the Union and it isn’t Scottish Labour.

Regardless of the outcome of the present Scottish Labour leadership contest, it won’t arrest the party’s downward trajectory. Anas Sarwar, the frontrunner, is a personable human being and a talented politician. Somewhere along the path of his successful career you might have imagined that someone might have acquainted him with the founding principles of his party. He can hardly be judged on his parents’ choices on the matter of his education.

And to maintain a multi-million-pound stake in, and receive handsome dividends from, the family firm would not in themselves be questionable: curious perhaps; slightly anomalous perhaps but not a hanging offence. To be unable adequately to account for the firm’s refusal to pay the Living Wage and failure to recognise a trade union is unconscionable for a person who seeks to lead a party that views each as a sacred article of faith.

There he was wallowing in militaristic metaphors with his vow to park his tanks on Nicola Sturgeon’s lawn. Is that really the best he and his advisers can come up with? Isn’t it the Tories he should be targeting: that party firmly entrenched in second place in Scottish politics above Labour? Richard Leonard, Mr Sarwar’s challenger for the party leadership, has been unable either to bear much scrutiny during an insipid campaign. His support for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and backing of the Westminster Party’s support for the nuclear deterrent is like a vegetarian who permits himself a wee ham shank now and then. Along with his opponent he has also espoused the now obligatory anti-SNP narrative.

Jeremy Corbyn on his recent tour of Scotland prior to next week’s Labour Party conference has not helped matters. The Labour leader has hardly put a foot wrong since his accession but he was badly advised during this tour to fire salvos at the SNP and independence.

If Labour is ever to become relevant again in Scotland it must find a way to reach those of its many former supporters who back the SNP. They won’t do this by choosing at every turn to mock their desire for self-determination. George Robertson seems to have embraced this insanity too.

One of Labour’s many Scottish Lords and a former Secretary General of Nato is living testament to how little can be made to go a long way in the Labour Party brotherhood if you have the right connections. His observation earlier this month that Scottish independence would have strengthened Islamic State and Al Qaeda is one of the decade’s daftest political quotes.

Scottish Labour’s two leadership hopefuls need to calm the anti-independence invective if they are to lead the party out of the shadows. And Mr Sarwar in particular needs to ditch his coat of many colours and find a red one instead. Could someone also buy him a history of the Labour Party?