SCHADENFREUDE is one of my favourite words.

I learned it from a German flatmate at university.

It means to take pleasure in other people’s misfortune. It’s not so nice, but we all experience it from time to time. It’s that feeling you get when you watch a YouTube video of someone pulling a motorbike wheelie and falling off, that feeling you get when someone slips on ice – you know they might be hurt but deep inside you have to admit it’s a bit funny.

It’s also the feeling you get when Theresa May calls an election she can’t lose, decides she doesn’t need to take part, and then loses as much as 15 per cent of her lead, with YouGov even predicting she might lose her majority.

The Tory manifesto makes Michael Foot’s 1983 “political suicide note” look like a slick bit of electioneering. The Tories rely on older voters, so the key economic concern of their core support is maintaining their pension, and their biggest fears in life include (understandably) Alzheimer’s disease – and yet the Conservative manifesto dropped the triple lock on pensions and set out plans for a so-called dementia tax. Those older voters largely support Brexit but are less familiar with the complexity of single market membership vs actual EU membership. They were also the first generation to be able to buy their council houses and they want to pass them on to their kids, not exhaust their property capital paying for their time in care homes.

The Conservative campaign took the electorate for granted, and has been arrogant, distant, controlling, insulting and fundamentally stupid in places. Don’t get me wrong, they will still win; that is to say they will have the largest share of the vote and the most seats in the House of Commons. However, Scottish leader Ruth Davidson will have to define that as wining an election while simultaneously describing a massive majority as an SNP loss. See what I mean: schadenfreude. But even a win with a slightly larger majority would be a disastrous failure when you start with a 22 per cent lead and expect a 100-seat majority.

We all know not to believe polls any more but if YouGov is correct about no overall control, then two things happen for Scotland. Firstly 50-plus SNP MPs could hold the balance of power and Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, as PM, would have to go for a soft Brexit, maintain membership of the single market and negotiate a Scottish referendum. Even a separate single market membership deal for Scotland could be back on the table.

Secondly, this means no EU issue, no hard borders, no fall in positive EU immigration to Scotland and no barriers to international students bringing their money to Scotland.

Some people will say, “Yes but a hard Brexit means hardship and that gives people a motivation for independence”. That’s true but it shouldn’t be any thinking person’s first choice. Even a soft Brexit will harm Scotland’s prosperity. Scotland, with 8.4 per cent of the UK population, receives 17.5 per cent of the EU grants to the UK. EU membership hardly costs Scotland anything and at the current pound-to-euro exchange rate, the EU is now probably paying us to be members. The most likely scenario is that post-Brexit UK, even if soft, won’t have the money to replace EU farm subsidies. Thousands of Scottish farm business and rural companies could go out of business and supermarket food prices would rocket. Inflation would lead to higher interest rates, increasing mortgage and credit card payments.

Any kind of Brexit will always hurt Scotland more than England, but those problems wouldn’t be insurmountable if we maintain membership of the single market and have the option of independence to offer when Brexit starts to erode our national prosperity.

Some nationalists say we should be fighting the independence argument now, making this General Election about a quick referendum or even making a unilateral declaration of independence, but that would be folly on a Tory manifesto scale.

That would be akin to ordering your 100 lightly-armed foot soldiers to mount a forlorn charge towards the enemy guns while ignoring that fact you have 10,000 cavalry and some super-heavy artillery arriving just as soon as Brexit starts to hit people’s pockets. The smart general defends their position and waits until the battle can’t be lost. Nicola Sturgeon is showing signs of being that smart general.

Could she have been more ready with the economic arguments for the next indyref? Could the SNP have kept the business community happier with smarter handling of the rates fiasco? Should there be more for business in the SNP manifesto? Sure – but let’s look at the big picture and think a little further than Theresa May seems able to do.

Business for Scotland this week launched a single market declaration that has already been signed by 100 directors and owners of Scottish SMEs. All are employers, and SMEs are the primary creators of wealth, added value employment and economic opportunity in Scotland.

They all signed the short and simple statement that: “We believe membership of the single market is vital for Scottish businesses, jobs, prosperity and economic growth. We call on all political parties to back protection of Scotland’s single market membership, the opportunities for investment, skills and trade that it offers businesses like ours and the wider benefits to Scotland’s economy.”

What really surprised us were the answers to the supplementary questions we asked. They showed that 37 per cent of respondents had an EU citizen as part of their team, even those with 10 or so employees, and 54 per cent traded within the single market. Many of the others will have benefited from part EU-funded council training programmes and Scottish Enterprise grants.

The 2014 White Paper made it clear that independence didn’t mean stopping trade with the rest of the UK and now it’s clear that leaving the EU doesn’t need to mean stopping trade with the single market.