Salmond predicts second vote on Union by next year

ALEX Salmond has claimed a second Scottish independence vote could take place in the autumn of 2018 – around four years after the last poll.

The former first minister spoke out on his LBC Radio phone-in programme yesterday, the day after Prime Minister Theresa May announced plans to take the UK out of the European single market.

Mr Salmond said that if Mrs May “flings down the gauntlet” and proceeds with her plans for a hard Brexit, then “Nicola Sturgeon will pick it up”.

He added: “The ball right now is in Downing Street’s court.”

Pressed on the timing of a possible second referendum, he said it would have to take place during the two-year Brexit negotiating period, which will begin in March when Mrs May triggers Article 50.

Mr Salmond said: “It has to be within the two-year negotiating period, so we would be talking about a year come the autumn,.

“You would have to have it within the two years, you would want to have the Scottish referendum before the Brexit process had been completed.”

In a speech on Tuesday setting out her objectives for EU withdrawal, Mrs May announced Britain will leave the single market but will seek a ‘’bold and ambitious’’ free trade agreement to allow it to continue doing business with its 27 former partners without having to pay “huge sums” into EU budgets.

She wants to take Britain out of the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice and restore control over immigration.

Mr Salmond also responded to commentator Iain Dale’s criticism of a tweet put out by Caithness SNP MP Dr Paul Monaghan which showed an image of Mrs May, mocked up to look like an authentic Government tweet, which satarised her speech. Mr Dale said it was an example of “fake news”, but the former SNP leader responded that Mr Dale was guilty of “faux outrage”.