Sketch

THE voters of Gordon willing, Alex Salmond will return shortly to haunt the Scottish Parliament. In the meantime, should Jack McConnell have anything to do with it, the Scottish Parliament will spook the SNP's semi-detached (technically speaking) leader.

If the Nationalists didn't see yesterday's assault coming, they can borrow my binoculars and my Junior International Spy X-Ray Specs.

Nicola Sturgeon wanted to talk about the council tax: best of luck. The First Minister just wanted the sniff of a hint of a mention of the man who hopes to replace him.

The problem has been lurking ever since Mr Salmond declared that he would lead us all to freedom one day, but in the meantime could be contacted c/o Imperial Occupying Forces, Westminster.

Or rather, there has been an issue in the making ever since Alex stepped down from the SNP leadership, then stepped up again.

One minute he was winning us a parliament, then he was quitting, then he was unquitting.

He had his reasons. No doubt they were good reasons.

The trouble is, they are not the sort of reasons upon which voters stuck in the rush hour smile indulgently. Labour, smart as whips, have spotted as much, finally.

Nicola suggested that Jack "runs a mile" from a Socratic dialogue - OK, "head to head debate" - with Alex.

Jack responded like a man who has just scored a month's supply of the good stuff from his neighbourhood smirk dealer. What a rush.

Jack: "Alex! Salmond! Had a chance! To stay in this parliament! And debate with all of us! He was the one! He was the one! That ran off to London the first time! He had a chance!

"Alex! Salmond! Is the one! Who hasn't even got the guts! To stand in the election! In May! And resign his Westminster seat! Before he does it!"

Labour's back benchers loved all of this, it is fair to say, in precisely the way they don't love talking about Blair, Iraq, Trident or, most of the time, Jack. Scots running away to London? For shame!

At that moment, students of political history were probably recalling the sight of the grand old Flying Socialist while it went steaming - as it were - from Queen Street and Waverley. "Non-stop to London", as the tickets used to say.

Jack's peroration could even have been applied to fare-dodgers named Gordon Brown, or John Reid, or Douglas Alexander, and to all those who sacrificed the right to run off to Edinburgh just to give others a shot.

However, these were passengers on the Union Central, not freed slaves on the Caledonian Underground Railway.

The First Minister was enjoying himself either way.

Ms Sturgeon, meanwhile, trusted to conditioned reflexes and the assertion - true but irrelevant - that Mr McConnell was trying to divert attention from the council tax.

For the first time in a while, there was a sense that Mr Salmond might not be quite the asset he, and his party, imagine. How many other people put down "Banff and Buchan" as security when they renew the household insurance?

It fell to Annabel Goldie to ask the question the SNP should have asked.

True, as the First Minister averred when failing to provide a straight answer, it was all Tory hypocrisy, indeed "opportunist populism".

For the commuters from Labour and LibDem constituencies in Fife and Tayside, however, it must have sounded like a relevant inquiry.

Why are there bridge tolls still in the east, but none for the Skye and Erskine crossings? Jack thought it "entirely irresponsible" to stoop to an explanation.

He was losing a parliamentary whip over that very issue at that very moment. Call that a hint, First Minister.