IN the upcoming by-election and the General Election to come, we are going to hear a lot from Labour in Scotland about the need for change.

On one hand, they aren’t wrong – we desperately need a change from the utter chaos that 14 years of Tory rule has wrought. On the other hand, what change are they actually offering?

In Scotland, we have a progressive government committed to social democratic principles of taxing those who earn the most, supporting those in the most need and furthering the rights of minority groups.

Labour would often be heard shouting from the sidelines that we were not going far enough, not being bold enough or radical enough with the powers we had to mitigate the worst of Westminster austerity.

What Labour are offering is no wealth tax, no changes to income tax, no increase in inheritance tax, no removal of the rape clause, no free school meals for children – in essence, no change.

The Labour Party of Sir Keir Starmer is both socially and fiscally conservative and if it was not being compared to the right/far-right Conservative Party, there is no chance that anyone would consider it to be in any way centre-left.

The Overton window has shifted so far right in the UK that the idea of feeding children makes you an unelectable communist in England.

And that’s the thing about Labour in Scotland; they will jump to the tune of the English electorate because their Westminster bosses make policy based on focus group results on how to take Tory votes.

We see this time and time again as Anas Sarwar twists and turns to wriggle out of every progressive policy position he has ever held.

The latest disappointing U-turn from Labour politicians has been in Glasgow City Council during a full council debate on addressing drug deaths in the city.

The SNP brought a motion in support of decriminalisation and treating addiction as a public health issue rather than a police matter.

This is the position of the World Health Organisation, it is the position of the Westminster Health and Social Care Committee and until recently it was the position of the Labour Party.

However, recently their frontbench decided that locking up those suffering addiction might win a few votes down south so Glasgow Labour doffed the cap and tugged the forelock and sold out their principles in the blink of an eye.

They were the only party to oppose this. In Glasgow, they are to the right of the Tories on health policy. Just let that sink in – the Conservatives have a more progressive health and social care position than Labour in Glasgow.

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Their council group leader, in a recent column, had the audacity to lambast every aspect of our city while ignoring the £750 million hole in the budget caused by his party. The equal pay scandal is one that the city will be dealing with for the next 30 years, costing it more than £35m each and every one of those years.

If the example of Glasgow wasn’t enough to convince you of the dangers of ever letting Labour near power in Scotland again then we just need to look south to Birmingham.

The city effectively declared bankruptcy this week, in no small part due to their implementation and then refusal to settle their own discriminatory pay structure. They had an extremely similar situation to Glasgow – the one difference being that they didn’t have the opportunity to elect an SNP administration to clean up their mess.

The real change we need is the removal of Westminster involvement in Scottish politics and the removal of an English veto on democratic decisions of our Parliament.

We need our renewable energy potential to fund a just transition and a fairer society, not to be used to plug the hole our oil revenues used to fill for London.

Change is impossible within the UK and changing the minds of those who don’t yet see that must be our defining mission as a party.