Nicola Sturgeon wants to have a “legal, constitutional referendum” on Scottish independence next year.
The First Minister announced a new Bill is to be published at Holyrood for a consultative vote on the matter today.
Ms Sturgeon also told MSPs the Bill will set out for a referendum to be held on October 19 2023.
In 2014, Scotland held a referendum when its inhabitants were asked if the country should become independent from the UK. More than 2 million people voted against independence at the time, whereas a little more than 1.6 million voted ‘Yes’.
A video of Sturgeon explaining the reasons for such a decision has emerged online.
Scotland has been ‘ripped out of the EU against our will’ and “saddled with the lowest growth in the G20” says Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon as she sets out plans to carry out a second referendum on Scottish independence.https://t.co/s1wtVBXER4
— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 28, 2022
📺 Sky 501 pic.twitter.com/CLxoViZEbF
Sturgeon said that the parliament will publish a draft Bill on an independence referendum, adding that the referendum itself should be legal and viewed as a fact and not just a public opinion. She also stressed that if the British government continues to block the possibility of another referendum, the Scottish National Party (SNP) will make independence the cornerstone of its manifesto at the next general election.
The First Minister said she would be writing to Prime Minister Boris Johnson to inform him of her plans.
She added she would make clear she is “ready and willing” to negotiate the terms of a Section 30 order with him, which would give Holyrood the power to hold a referendum.
But with the Prime Minister having repeatedly refused her calls for another referendum to be held, Ms Sturgeon added “What I am not willing to do, what I will never do is allow Scottish democracy to be a prisoner of Boris Johnson or any prime minister.”