DESPITE the gleeful claims of the apologists for Brexit and Anglo-British nationalism that the SNP has "imploded" and it is all over for Scottish independence – and that Labour is poised to form the next Scottish Government – there is abundant evidence that these claims are based more in the wishful thinking of anti-independence politicians and their friends in the media than in reality.

Saturday's well attended independence march and rally in Glasgow showed that there is plenty of life left in the grassroots independence movement.

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Glasgow to show that the independence cause is alive and kicking and enjoys considerably greater popular support in Scotland than a king whose 'abhorronation' has been rammed down all our throats in an orgy of sycophantic media saturation.

The contrast between the many thousands who attended the independence march and the sparsely attended coronation events was striking even though plans for the former had been given almost no media publicity whereas the royalist events were widely touted. It was a telling illustration of the growing gulf in public attitudes between Scotland and the rest of the UK.

Further evidence comes from the fact that support for independence has not been dented in opinion polling despite a constant and unceasing barrage of negative media attention on the SNP's financial difficulties from a Scottish press that has quickly glossed over Conservative financial scandals involving sums of money which are many times greater.

Last but by no means least that barrage of media criticism has resulted in a boost in the SNP's membership, with almost 3000 new members signing up in the past couple of months.

BBC Scotland paid lip service to the widespread lack of interest in Scotland in the king's ego massage, briefly telling us that a lot of people in Scotland were not really interested before quickly moving on to interview such representative examples of Scottish public opinion as an auld dear in a union flag frock at a coronation party, an avid collector of royalist memorabilia, and a dedicated fan of the Windsor’s who had travelled to London to camp out on the Mall in order to get a front row view of the parade.

The BBC Scotland website had a headline proclaiming Scotland celebrates the coronation over a photo of a celebrating family who on closer inspection turned out to be visitors from England. Yet again, when BBC Scotland was put to the test, it dismally failed to present an accurate picture of Scotland. Instead, we got a fantasy Scotland that would not offend the British nationalist sensibilities of the BBC's bosses in London.

READ MORE: Coronation protest sees journalist arrested and press pass seized

It's clearly far too much to expect that Scotland as a part of the UK can have a media which accurately reflects the realities of modern Scotland. What we get instead is a media desperately trying to shoehorn Scotland into a compliant region of North Britain, filled with auld dears in union flag frocks and collectors of royalist memorabilia.

The coronation was more than just an exercise in pseudo-medieval feudalism with fancy costumes which took itself far too seriously as it celebrated an entitled and privileged billionaire who treated the entire exercise as a dreadful imposition and scarcely cracked a smile all day. It was also an assault on all our civil liberties.

The Conservatives had rushed through their Public Order Act in the days before the event, giving the police sweeping powers to crack down on protests and demonstrations. The police arrested and detained dozens of anti-monarchy protesters, confiscating their Not My King banners and placards. Some protesters were reportedly arrested for nothing more than wearing a T-shirt reading Not My King.

Graham Smith, the head of the group Republic, who was himself arrested and detained for 16 hours, said the decision of the Metropolitan Police to break up his organisation's planned protest before it had even begun trampled over their rights, adding that his group had been in conversation with Scotland Yard for months beforehand. However, it seems clear that the police did not want any manifestation of anti-royal sentiment to intrude upon the King's vision as his carriage passed Trafalgar Square.

The Public Order Act gives the police unprecedented powers to arrest protesters and to break up demonstrations in England and Wales. Lengthy jail sentences are now possible for protesters who 'lock on' in a bid to make it difficult for police to remove them. The new laws will include a 12-month prison sentence for protesters who block roads, a six-month jail term and an unlimited fine for anyone who locks on to others, a building, or an object. The police also have greater stop and search powers to prevent disruptive protests, including stop and search even without reasonable suspicion that such a protest is about to take place.

Even some Conservatives fear that the bill has gone too far. Conservative peer Camilla Cavendish described the Act as an "affront to civilised society." These new authoritarian measures come on top of other recent Conservative legislation which cracks down on the right of workers to take industrial action.

However, senior Labour MP David Lammy said over the weekend that a future Labour government would not repeal the Public Order Act.

Labour is hell bent on moving to the right in order to attract former Conservative voters in the north and Midlands of England. Judging from Labour's successes in Thursday's English local elections on Thursday, it seems likely that Starmer will double down on this strategy, turning Labour into mini-me Brexit supporting Tories singing God Save the King and doing nothing to reverse the alarming descent into authoritarianism which is a feature of the current British government.