General election is not about independence debate, says Nicola Sturgeon

THE General Election is not about deciding whether Scotland should be independent, the First Minister has said.

In an interview on STV’s Scotland Tonight programme, Nicola Sturgeon said independence would be for a subsequent debate about the country’s future where she “would have to set out the process for re-securing our future with Europe.”

She said she wants Scotland to be a “full member of the European Union”, but declined to say if it would feature in the SNP manifesto for the upcoming election.

Ms Sturgeon told STV: “If I start to tell you one thing about my manifesto then you will ask me all sorts of other questions.

“Parties set out their manifestos in elections. But I am not trying to hide anything from you here, my position on the European Union is clear. But I have said we have to recognise where we are. It may be that Tories are taking, well the Tories want to take, us out of the European Union.

“Clearly I then, and this election is not deciding whether or not Scotland is independent, but in a future debate about that I would have to set out the process for re-securing our future with Europe.”

Scottish Lib Dem leader Willie Rennie said: “Nicola Sturgeon is taking Scots for fools if she thinks we’ll believe her codswallop on the purpose of the election. She has spent weeks demanding an independence referendum but now wants us to forget all about it.

“Just last week she claimed a win for the SNP in the election would be a mandate for another independence referendum. This week she claims the opposite.

“At the last general election she claimed her MPs would not argue for independence. Yet their MPs put independence at the top of their priorities at Westminster.

“It’s a pretty transparent attempt to grip on to the votes of people who are turning their backs on the SNP.

“For the SNP it’s all about independence and that has been exposed for us all to see over 10 years in power.”