Timing of new independence plan makes SNP look foolish
Mr Swinney had reckoned that this was precisely the time to launch, in a newspaper article, his latest campaign to break up Britain by setting out his stall for Scottish independence.
He was wrong. He failed pretty dismally to muscle in on the major event by writing that he will demand a new referendum be held if his party wins a majority of seats at the Scottish Parliament election next May.
If anyone really cared, it didn't look like it. Other than a brief statement in that he believed that John Swinney was a nice man and that he'd be meeting him later, the president said he'd rather not get involved in the independence issue. However, he did mention that he'd been in Scotland on the day before the last referendum in September 2014, when he said that he had been right in predicting the result, adding: 'I like to be correct.'
And he went on to say that back then he had understood that it would be '50 or 70 years before they can take another vote', as they couldn't go through that again.
Furthermore, just in case anyone believed that there was even an iota of disagreement between the two leaders over breaking up Britain, Keir Starmer insisted that a stronger Scotland would be better off within the strength of the United Kingdom. And he said it was time that Mr Swinney spent more time getting domestic policies right in Scotland, rather than the constitution.
Pipe dream
The new independence 'masterplan', if such it is, from the First Minister represents a significant change in nationalist plans.
Previously Nicola Sturgeon has said that she'd demand a new legal referendum – so-called indyref2 – if next year's Holyrood vote produced an overall majority in the new parliament of all the parties which supported independence.
But what John Swinney is planning – and perhaps this is his main objective after all – is to re-vitalise his party's activists who've been furious at the lack of determination in the SNP leadership in recent years to pursue their lifelong objective of Scottish independence.
Instead, they've had to put up with La Sturgeon's supposed obsession with issues like gender reform, which caused several years of bitter internal feuding but also saw the UK Government veto-ing her most controversial legislation.
Several things are certain – talking about getting a majority of SNP members elected next year, given the party's poor record on issues like the health service and education, would be hard enough. But actually using such a majority to actually gain a new referendum is, I think, a huge 'ask' given that all of the parties likely to form the government at Westminster are opposed.
And as for actually winning Scottish independence seems to be the pipe dream it always has been.
The president was untypically diplomatic in seeking to stay out of the debate about Scottish independence but went out of his way to repeat, time and again, his love of Scotland, where his mother was born.
And he also made plain his desire that Scotland should do well. 'I want to see Scotland thrive,' he said.
There were also numerous references from the president during the Turnberry news conference about his admiration and respect for King Charles, who is known, like his mother, to be an undeclared but unsurprising backer of his United Kingdom.
And it is worth remembering that Queen Elizabeth played a crucial – if extremely low-key – role in that 2014 referendum. I can't imagine her successor being any different.
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