Lack of rivals keeping Sturgeon safe in SNP leadership says Sillars

● Former deputy leader hits out ● SNP points to Labour infighting

Former SNP deputy leader Jim Sillars has suggested that only a lack of suitable candidates to challenge Nicola Sturgeon for the leadership is allowing her to remain safe in the post.

The veteran independence campaigner also said there should not be another referendum for at least another five years to allow Nationalists to reframe the case for a Yes vote.

Mr Sillars criticised Ms Sturgeon’sjudgmentinpushingfor a second referendum after the Brexit vote, insisting it caused the loss off 21 seats in this year’s Westminster election.

“She’s the only one we’ve got at the present time,” Mr Sillars told The Sunday Politics Show

0 Jim Sillars with Nicola Sturgeon and Alex Salmond on the campaign trail before the referendum on BBC Scotland when asked if Ms Sturgeon should remain as leader. “Suppose

Nicola

was knocked over by a bus this afternoon where are the candidates of the necessary stature to take over the leadership of the SNP?

“She’s what we’ve got at the present time and I would like to see her improve.”

He added: “If there was someone better around who had the intellectual capability to understand that you’ve got to analyse these things first before you take a decision, yes I think she should step aside. But there’s no-one there at the moment.”

Mr Sillars is also sceptical about Ms Sturgeon’s recent claim that she may hold a second referendum before the next Holyrood election in 2021

“You cannot actually have one sensibly until you know exactly what the Brexit deal is in detail and then take time to assess it and take time to actually formulate an argument for independence.

“What was in 2014 will no longer be the case after Brexit, so we have to have a new thinking of the structure which we put to the Scottish people.”

A “post-mortem” is needed on the reasons for defeat in the first referendum, he said, or the Yes side will lose again.

He added: “You’re probably ‘22/’23 before you actually have the referendum.”

However this could mean the pro-independence majority is lost at the Scottish Parliament.

A spokesman for the SNP compared the party with the infighting of the current Labour leadership contest.

“Scottish Labour are a shambles, from top to bottom – and the only thing certain is that they will remain so after this bitter, feud-ridden leadership contest.

“Richard Leonard supports a new generation of nuclear weapons on the Clyde and also backs an extreme Tory Brexit that threatens many thousands of Scottish jobs – there is nothing remotely progressive about either of these positions.

“Only the SNP will stand up for Scotland’s best interests.”