SNP leader blasts claims

Nicola Sturgeon has hit back at claims SNP MPS are only voting against the prime minister’s Brexit agreement in the hope the “chaos” of no deal will help bring about a second independence referendum.

Scottish Conservative interim leader Jackson Carlaw urged the first minister to get behind the draft Withdrawal Agreement drawn up by Theresa May, insisting it is “the only deal on the table”.

Supporting the deal “delivers an orderly exit, protects jobs”, and also gives fishermen in Scotland “more control of our waters than we’ve had for half a century”, he said. He claimed the SNP will vote against this at Westminster on December 11 in the hope it will deliver “more chaos, more upheaval and all in the hope that it will deliver her obsession with a second independence referendum”.

Ms Sturgeon said yesterday it was the Tories who were “exploiting” the issue, however, to “avoid hard questions on Brexit”.

Responding at First Minster’s Questions, she said: “He talks about the SNP using Brexit to advance the case for independence – let me say to him Brexit does that all by itself, it doesn’t need any help from the SNP.”