Ever since the Supreme Court ruled in November 2022 that the Scottish Parliament could not hold a unilateral referendum on breaking up Britain, Scottish independence has been dead in the water. Nicola Sturgeon went, Humza Yousaf came (and went not too long after), the party lost all but a handful of its Commons seats in the general election, and John Swinney, a man with the personality of a pedestrian crossing, limped home in May’s devolved elections on the SNP’s lowest vote share in two decades. Beset by headlines about women banged up with rapists, missing ferries, and embezzled camper vans, the Nationalists just couldn’t catch a break. Until now.

Prime Minister’s Questions is a minefield. The best tackle it strategically, weaving around potential ordinances with quick wits and a light foot. The less capable alternate between tiptoes and sprints as their nerve allows, their thoughts consumed by reaching the other side in one piece. Andy Burnham took a unique approach to PMQs on Wednesday. By ‘unique’ I mean ‘unusual’, and by ‘unusual’ I mean ‘disastrous’. Instead of dodging the landmines, he volunteered his foot for one, and one of the most explosive there is.

Asked by the SNP’s Chris Law to legislate to give Scotland the same legal right to a border poll as exists in Northern Ireland, the Prime Minister opted not to reject the notion that the constitutional situation north of the border was in any way comparable to the settlement across the Irish Sea. No, Burnham – and here is where that unique approach comes in – agreed with the premise of the question. He told Law that a border poll in Ulster would be contemplated ‘when public opinion has changed to the point at which the call has to be considered’. He then added:

‘I would say that it is exactly the same situation in Scotland. I am not aware that there is majority public support for another referendum, and until that changes, there will not be one.’

Exactly the same situation. Burnham is, as best as I can tell, the first prime minister in British history to place Scotland, one of the two founding nations of what is now the United Kingdom, on the same constitutional footing as Northern Ireland, where British sovereignty became essentially conditional with the signing of the Belfast Agreement in 1998. Downing Street has since attempted to walk back the remarks, insisting that Burnham was not putting forward a new position, but Pandora’s Box doesn’t have a reseal-and-return option.

No one seriously believes Andy Burnham was articulating a novel constitutional policy because, come on, it’s Andy Burnham. He’s got nice hair and plays a decent ‘Rusholme Ruffians’, but no one is going to mistake him for a policy maven. Burnham is strictly a TikTok, breakfast telly, footie banter, sentimental-northern-cause prime minister. He’s a 3G intellect in a 5G job, and his opponents are under no obligation to make allowances for his limitations. His gaffe has put wind in the SNP’s sails and John Swinney has written to the PM requesting a meeting about the details of the mechanism for granting another referendum.

For the past 24 hours, this has been the top politics story on Scottish television and radio. Handed an unforced error by an untested prime minister, the SNP is showing signs of life for the first time in years. It senses weakness and, worse, cluelessness from a bloke whose only real desire in politics is to be liked, a very dangerous sort to have on your side but a gift of an opponent.

I consider Andy Burnham wholly unsuited to the role of prime minister

The SNP will make frequent use of Burnham’s answer in the months and years to come, and the answer, unlike the subsequent spin, was captured on video. Scottish voters will become very familiar with that video in time. It shows the British prime minister saying majority support for a second referendum is the criterion for granting a referendum. In retreating from Burnham’s statement, opponents of independence are put on the back foot, forced to argue against majoritarianism, which most voters consider synonymous with democracy. When a prime minister speaks, his words are carried in echo; when he misspeaks, they are carried in loudspeaker.

I consider Andy Burnham wholly unsuited to the role of prime minister, a needy personality that performed well in local politics but is not equal to the demands of national affairs. But even I have to admit that he does have a certain political flair. The three most recent SNP leaders spent years trying to revive the cause of Scottish independence, and Burnham did it in one sentence.