There was a feeling of relief in the air at the SNP’s conference in Aberdeen when, for the first time in years, organisers could accurately describe the main hall as full. The choice of the P&J Live was a risky one (and one, I was told, that is unlikely to be made again) given its expansive size makes everything else, including the crowd, seem pretty small. But a sense of cautious optimism persisted: First Minister and party leader John Swinney had stabilised the party after a torrid few years of infighting and police probes and, in part thanks to Nigel Farage’s effectiveness and Keir Starmer’s lack thereof, the party was back to polling well ahead of Labour.

Much of the first day was spent discussing independence, with grassroots activists openly sceptical of the First Minister’s strateg

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