From Wn.com

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has ruled out holding a second Scottish independence referendum this year but said another ballot remained “highly likely,” The Guardian reported.

Sturgeon suggested to STV News that she would wait to see the direction of the Brexit negotiations.

“There is not going to be an independence referendum in 2017. I don’t think there is anybody who thinks that is the case.” – Nicola Sturgeon

The majority of Scottish people voted to remain in the European Union in the June referendum, and the Scottish government has already drafted legislation for a second referendum vote on independence, which it has said it will use if it is the only option to protect Scotland’s place in the single market.

Over the weekend, Sturgeon denied she had been “bluffing” about the potential for a second poll but indicated that a soft Brexit, which kept the UK in the single market, would be enough to take the referendum off the table in the short-term.

“We have to ask ourselves in Scotland: Are we happy to have the direction of our country, the kind of country we want to be, determined by a right-wing Conservative government perhaps for the next 20 years, or do we want to take control of our own future?” she told The Andrew Marr Show on BBC One.

Asked if she would anticipate a referendum within five to 10 years, she said: “I would think, yes. But let me not get away from this point, I’m putting to (Prime Minister) Theresa May a compromise solution.”

A Number 10 Downing Street spokeswoman said the Brexit negotiations would focus on the whole of the UK, and that the Scottish government should abide by the decision in the 2014 independence referendum.

WN.com, Jim Berrie

For more on this story and video go to: https://article.wn.com/view/2017/01/10/Scottish_Leader_Rules_Out_Second_Independence_Referendum_Thi/