I DON’T know which experts have the ear of Nicola Sturgeon these days. But I sure hope that National columnist Michael Fry isn’t one of them.

Full credit to the colourful right-wing historian for breaking ranks with his once beloved Tory Party over independence. He has long been a maverick whose voice deserves a place in this newspaper, if only to remind us that not all conservatives buy into the Rule Britannia-singing, Union Flag-waving British nationalism championed by Ruth Davidson, the Captain Mainwaring of the 21st century.

But Fry’s idiosyncratic take on Scottish history, which includes justification of the Highland Clearances and deep hostility to the Gaelic language, is rooted in the prejudices of a bygone age.

And his call for the independence movement to turn right and embrace free-market capitalism is a road map that will lead straight to the edge of the cliff.

On June 8, the combined vote in Scotland for the progressive left-of-centre manifestos offered by the SNP, Labour and the Greens amounted to 64 per cent of the electorate. In England, 44 per cent supported Labour and the Greens.

That 20-point gap suggests that, despite the electrifying advance of Jeremy Corbyn, there remains a major gulf in political attitudes north and south of the Border.

In Scotland, the right is far weaker than in England, and has been for the best part of two centuries, apart from a blip in the mid-1950s.

But that 64 per cent figure also illuminates the only sensible orientation for the SNP if it is to get back on track. A future Yes vote will not be won by persuading some Tory defectors back into the fold, but by turning left.

Michael Fry’s unusual political evolution notwithstanding, the overwhelming majority of the 29 per cent who voted for Ruth Davidson’s hard-line Unionist party can safely be written off.

We should also remember that the turnout on June 8 was 20 points down on the 2014 independence referendum. And of that 970,000 people who voted in the referendum, then failed to show on June 8, you can bet your last paper £5 note that the overwhelming majority were young, poor or both. In other words, they were Yes voters.

Add the abstentions to the SNP and Labour vote and that amounts to a mighty 2.7 million. Do we concentrate them – or on the 940,000 who voted Tory, LibDem or Ukip?

Mathematically, it’s a no-brainer. Politically, it means a radical shake-up in the both the SNP and the wider independence movement if we are to deliver independence between 2019 and 2021. Jeremy Corbyn has not only shifted politics to the left, he has taken a blow torch to the orthodoxy that has for long been ingrained into the psyche of the professional political classes. For decades, the spin doctors and marketeers convinced everyone that to win mass public support, political parties had to play it safe, keep the mainstream media on board, and make sure they didn’t scare the business tycoons.

So where now for the SNP? Some in the independence movement don’t really care. They would still support Yes in a referendum, but voted for Corbyn’s Labour Party on June 8 – and may not be easily shifted from that allegiance.

There is, however, a problem for independence supporters like myself who are to the left of the SNP.

If, as now seems likely, the Brexit negotiations drag on beyond 2021, Nicola Sturgeon’s timetable may be delayed until after the next Holyrood elections. And if that fails to deliver a pro-independence majority, then Scotland will be denied the right to self-determination until at least the middle of the next decade. And with all due respect to the smaller independence parties, we won’t get that majority without a strong SNP.

So where do the SNP go from here? Things have moved on since 2015. Scottish Labour have been rescued from oblivion by a man most of them despised, and whose politics they condemned. Much of the Scottish Labour leadership is closer politically to Ruth Davidson and Theresa May than to Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell.

They supported nuclear weapons, idolised the war criminal Tony Blair, cheered on the deregulation of the banks by Gordon Brown and supported privatisation in our schools and hospitals.

But people have short memories. Or as the old football cliché goes, you’re only as good as your last game. If the SNP don’t now change tactics dramatically, it will be left stranded – and September 18, 2014 will go down in the history books as a glorious failure, the day we almost got there before allowing the dream to slip away.

To recapture the momentum we need boldness, flair and ideas that will rekindle the fires of those who are drifting away from politics, or looking south to Labour in Westminster for salvation.

Because of the enormity of the implications of a hard Brexit it’s right that Nicola Sturgeon does whatever it takes to protect Scotland from the fall-out. And that consumes time and energy. But even without Brexit, we would still be facing the grim prospect of four more years of Tory cuts and austerity. During the General Election campaign, Jeremy Corbyn came to Scotland and, to quote one newspaper report, “accused the SNP of standing up for the establishment rather than Scotland by ‘passing the buck’ on austerity and handing down Conservative spending cuts”.

That clamour will grow in the years to come as Scottish Labour try to recover support in their traditional heartlands. And if the SNP focus narrowly on Brexit, they risk of being seen as out of touch with the people in those same heartlands. I’ve no influence in the SNP, but if I had, I’d be arguing for the party to turn the tables by launching a Scotland Against Austerity movement and inviting Labour, the STUC, the Greens, the LibDems, the smaller left-of-centre parties and Scotland’s non-Tory councils to become part of a national crusade to protect Scotland from Westminster cuts. Such a movement, like the Poll Tax non-payment campaign of the late 1980s and early 1990s, would have democratic legitimacy on its side.

In the General Election 70 per cent of the Scottish electorate voted against Tory austerity. Westminster has no mandate in Scotland to carry on forcing through cuts to public budgets and social security– especially when it plans to give extra money to Northern Ireland as a bribe to the DUP.

Such a call would challenge Scottish Labour to put their money where their mouth is. Are the party serious about joining forces in a united front to defend Scotland from austerity? Or do the words of Corbyn – echoed by a number Scottish Labour politicians during the election – amount to nothing more than empty rhetoric? Either way, the SNP have to take the lead, not just on Brexit, but on defending Scotland from potentially another four years of Tory cuts.

Finally, I would suggest that a famous quote by Nye Bevan, the Welsh-born Labour politician who delivered the NHS, should be put on a plaque and displayed prominently place in the SNP’s HQ. “You know what happens to people who stay in the middle road? They get knocked down.”