First minister reads runes over Indyref2

Analysis: Tactics unravel with polls

The first minister’s decision to put her Indyref2 plans on ice shows she was profoundly shocked to see her party’s big beasts fall as victims of a Tory surge.

Ms Sturgeon’s confirmation she has postponed legislation for a referendum before Brexit day in 2019, means her initial aim of holding a vote before the UK leaves the EU is almost certainly dead. The proposal was already left on life-support by the prime minister’s refusal to countenance the option in March and polls showing support in the doldrums even among SNP supporters.

But the decision to axe the possibility of an independent Scotland sailing into the EU as part of the UK member state is a blow to her independence hopes, and will make the scenario more of a risk for many supporters.

In some ways, the first minister will breathe a sigh of relief after finally dropping plans, which were forced upon her unexpectedly early and before her party had time to re-position itself after losing the first referendum in 2014.

When Ms Sturgeon swept into Bute House the morning after the Brexit vote and announced a second independence referendum was highly likely, her righteous indignation about Scotland’s pro-EU vote being ignored looked like it could stir support.

But when a weary Scottish electorate simply shrugged and accepted Brexit, even as the path to the hardest Brexit possible was set out, her confidence ebbed away too.

By the time this year’s general election campaigning hit its stride and her government’s demands to be heard in Brexit negotiations had been repeatedly rebuffed, she appeared to have lost her appetite for the fight. Worse, a compla- cency set in about SNP heartlands in the northeast, where a lack of attention allowed the Scottish Conservatives to singlemindedly campaign against a second independence referendum.

The near 50-50 Brexit vote in Moray left her deputy Angus Robertson under threat to begin with, but the bullish push for another independence referendum seemed to tip many voters over the edge.

To lose former first minister Alex Salmond showed just how far voters had been pushed away from his dream of independence, which killed off his 25-year parliamentary career.

But to see the north-east turn almost entirely from gold to blue as the Tories won every target seat they had set their sights was a devastating blowback to independence that has left the party reeling. Now, it appears the first minister has taken the message sent so loudly from the northeast – that now is not the time for more constitutional change – to heart. For now.

NOT FOR NOW: The immediate prospect of another independence referendum has been dismissed