Gina Miller and Best4Britain consider backing the SNP, a party dedicated to breaking up Britain

There is a bizarre but revealing story in The Scotsman this weekend. The paper’s Westminster correspondent reports that Gina Miller’s Best4Britain (the rather presumptuously named ultra-remainer organisation) may dole out cash and support to the SNP. Nicola Sturgeon is opposed to what she terms a “hurd Toree Brexit” and Best4Britain wants to overturn Brexit, or dilute Brexit, by designing a Brexit that makes it easy for the UK to go back into the EU.

To that end Best4Britain held a launch this week and is locating candidates who agree with its position. The aim is to crowd-fund financial support for anti-Brexit candidates. The SNP fits the bill, according to The Scotsman, and can expect a helping hand in its battle again the resurgent Tories, who are led by Ruth Davidson. She voted to Remain but now thinks (like almost 70% of Britain) that we have to get on with it. In contrast, Best4Britain is getting ready to back the SNP, my old paper The Scotsman says.

Hold on that simply can’t be true, I thought on reading the story. No organisation calling itself Best4Britain would support a political party that thinks the best thing for Britain is to break it up? The SNP is dedicated to breaking up the UK. That’s what it’s for.

I expected from Best4Britain a robust 100% denial of interest in supporting the SNP, a party that is dedicated to breaking up Britain. Did I mention the breaking up Britain bit already?

“Best for Britain has not yet made any commitment to specific candidates,” a spokesman told me.

Eh? So Best4Britain might give financial support to the SNP? It is considering it? Yes, it seems, and several opportunities to rule it out were turned down.

“The campaign will have more news on the process of selecting candidates shortly.” Not this weekend, apparently.

It will be fascinating to see what Gina Miller and her friends do decide, although it becomes steadily more obvious that while a court action on Article 50 and public relations fuss is one thing, getting fully entangled in a general election is more difficult by some way. As a mere observer, I can testify that politics is extremely tough to do well and successfully. It’s not a science project. Asking for votes and getting them is hard and people who do it spend ages learning how.

Any Remainer who wants to dedicate the next 25 years to getting the UK back into the EU and into the euro is welcome to try. Knock yourself out, if you think it is a fruitful way to spend your time. But getting into the political arena, calling yourself Best4Britain, and then pondering backing parties who want to to break up Britain, is not getting the enterprise off to the best start.