IF I may adapt that old expression used of the US economy, it seems that if leader of the British Labour Party Keir Starmer sneezes, Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, gets a good deal worse than a bad cold.

Starmer’s December Ipsos poll ratings show only 27 per cent of respondents were satisfied with his performance, with 61 per cent dissatisfied. This comes on the back of a slew of controversial policy decisions and, more importantly, an economy that is showing little sign of the growth Starmer promised, even if it is very early days of the promised infrastructural projects.

The success of Bidenomics in generating growth in the US was not enough to save the Democrats in the November elections, given the corrosive effect of inflation — annualised inflation rates were 5.4 per cent under Joe Biden as opposed to 1.9 per cent under Donald Trump.

Consequently, while average weekly earnings grew under the Democrats, workers were unable to keep up with the increase in prices. Hence Labour’s unease about the creeping inflation rate in Britain, especially given the likely attempt by employers to recoup the rise in National Insurance rates by suppressing wage increases.

It is possible that Starmer could have survived the criticism he suffered on his regressive stance on the two-child benefit cap and winter fuel payments — polling evidence suggests only minority support for reversing those decisions — but on the Waspi women, he may find tougher opposition. However, as always, it is likely to be the economy that decides his fate as leader of the Labour Party and that of his government.

It may well also fatally undermine the prospects of the return to power in Holyrood of the Scottish Labour Party. As reported by the Star’s Scottish correspondent Matt Kerr, support for Sarwar began to seep away immediately after Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachael Reeves’s Budget.

A Norstat poll on November 1 put support for Scottish Labour in the constituency section of the vote at 23 per cent, a drop of seven points since August and 22 per cent in the regional list, a drop of six points. This would have given Scottish Labour 29 MSPs in Holyrood, not enough to overtake the SNP.

Significantly, the same poll found that only 17 per cent of respondents felt the chancellor’s Budget statement would have had a positive impact on their household, while 29 per cent said it would have had a negative impact.

The same polling organisation provided another poll just over a month later, in early December. It had got worse for Scottish Labour. In the constituency section, their vote fell to 21 per cent, with 18 per cent in the regional list.

This is all a far cry from earlier in the year when Scottish Labour led the SNP. In May, a YouGov poll gave 35 per cent to Labour in the constituency vote compared to the SNP’s 34 per cent. In the list vote, Labour got 32 per cent, to the SNP’s 28 per cent.

In the December poll, the SNP, otherwise lurching from one crisis to another and with the Branchform investigation into their finances still hanging over them, sat at 37 per cent in the constituency section and 32 per cent in the regional list. As Sarwar is quick to point out, a poll is just a poll, just a snapshot at a particular time, but unlike Westminster, this snapshot is much closer to the actual election, May 2026, some 18 months away.

It’s just as well for Labour the Westminster elections are in far off 2029 because, according to Norstat, in the space of five months, support for Labour in Scotland for a Westminster election has fallen from 35 per cent to just 20 per cent of the vote, a shift that would decimate the current batch of Scottish Labour MPs.

In case there is an impulse on the Scottish left to say “Hell mend ye,” it would be instructive to look at what this means for the socialist project and Scottish society as a whole.

Unlike Reform, which, according to Ballot Box Scotland, is now projected to win 13 seats in Holyrood, the left inside and outside the Labour Party, including in the independence movement, is hardly shaping Scottish politics. Indeed, you could argue that it is being further marginalised by the right’s advance, an advance accelerated by austerity and a failing economy.

Those who believe that Reform is only attractive to Tory voters or right-wing labour voters should think again. Believe in Scotland, a pro-independence pressure group had a close look at the Norstat poll referred to above.

Among its findings, Norstat gave a majority of 54 per cent to 46 per cent in favour of independence. Here is their comment on that number: “… the 54 per cent Yes poll has a number that surprises me; 40 per cent of people who voted Reform in Scotland at the 2024 general election support Scottish independence.

“That suggests that Reform have more Scottish independence supporters in their ranks than the Conservatives at 21 per cent, UK Labour in Scotland at 31 per cent and the Lib Dems at 36 per cent.”

The left and, in particular, the Labour left cannot allow the economic conditions to prevail that threaten the very basis of social progress through race hate and growing inequality. That means creating a sound economy with properly funded public services based on democratic control.

In a nutshell, the Scottish Labour left has to work with all those prepared to support an initiative to develop an alternative manifesto to that being offered by Starmer and Sarwar for the 2026 election.

The details can be debated, but it must, as a minimum, demand the powers the Scottish Parliament needs, in particular borrowing powers, to build an economy that addresses the people’s needs for an inclusive, high-quality system of lifelong education and training, a safe, warm home for all, fully funded democratically accountable public services and well-paid, secure jobs.

In addition, the STUC’s report Scotland Demands Better: Fairer Taxes for a Fairer Future provides a route for securing the funding for decent public services by replacing the council tax with a proportional property tax and creating a Scottish wealth tax. Socialists and progressives in the Scottish labour movement, working together, can make this happen. That must be our immediate and paramount task for the new year.