LAST WEEK'S elections in Scotland, Wales and England will, like Brexit, be seen as a watershed moment in politics.

England confirmed it is conservative, with a small and a large C. Labour has lost its heartlands over Brexit and will not find them easy to recapture. Scotland has again shown its radical political streak and where that will lead will dominate politics in the years ahead.

The outcome also cemented Brexit. It is here to stay and is beyond any political challenge, probably for a generation. That means ways must be found to make it work better, particularly in food and agriculture.

When it comes to farming, it is becoming harder by the day to see the differences between UK government and EU agricultural policy. Farmers, particularly in England, were sold Brexit as a way to free themselves from the diktats of Brussels and the CAP. What they are on course to end up with is CAP light, with less money and looser funding assurances but with the same green and animal welfare policies.

These are driven by a politically influential urban elite in England. In the Queen's Speech this week on future legislation, the government backed the welfare lobby by agreeing new laws, including a ban on live exports and higher welfare standards on farms as the price of financial support. This puts it on exactly the same path as the EU, but without the counterbalance of member states where the farming voice still holds sway.

This election result in Scotland put the issue of devolution right at the centre of politics. Boris Johnson is determined to block an independence referendum and part of his strategy will be to find ways to make devolution more effective. Agriculture is an area where this is crying out to happen.

The policies being discussed for the UK by the government are effectively English policies to tackle what are perceived as UK-wide problems. This is not the case. The government and many of its supporters do not really get it, but the devolved regions are different in every way. That is certainly the case when it comes to priorities for farming and food.

Given that Brexit is here to stay it has to be made to work. That means it must be seen as a better policy for farmers than the CAP. In Scotland that will only be possible if the policy is driven wholly by Scottish interests and Scottish priorities. Emboldened by the election result, Scotland needs to tell London it will do its own thing in agriculture and that it sees most of the plans being hatched at Westminster as irrelevant.

The government in London must recognise now that failure to accept this, as part of a much bigger devolution equation, can only drive demands for an independence referendum. Just as the pressure for a vote on EU membership became a thorn in the side of successive Conservative leaders, the same will apply to relations between London and Edinburgh, unless Boris Johnson can not only show but prove that devolution is delivering.

The government decision on animal welfare legislation has gone down well with the general public. This is no surprise, and equally unsurprising is that it stopped short of being truly bold by extending its new approach to food imports. This is the fatal flaw in all green or other moral code type legislation. Often it becomes about exporting the problem.

The classic example is that the UK and EU fly a green flag, which people say they want, while buying goods from China that are cheap because coal-fired power stations guarantee cheap electricity.

With its legislation on animal welfare the government had the perfect opportunity to show some interest in agriculture by demanding that imports, whether from the EU or further afield, match those objectives. It ducked this possibility, offering instead bland assurances while effectively confirming trade deals and cheap food are more important.

On the issue of trade, the UK made much last week of a trade deal with India. The EU immediately countered that by confirming that it too is in discussions with India on an equally and possibly more ambitious trade deal.

We have again had the trade minister, Liz Truss, talking up post-Brexit trade deals, as proof that Brexit can deliver. She claimed deals worth £900 billion were ready to be signed, but until something actually happens people will continue to see her approach as all talk and no action.