SCOTLAND’S Brexit Minister Mike Russell told Holyrood yesterday that the Westminster Government’s position on Brexit would determine the “timetable” for an independence referendum.

In answer to a question by Green MSP Ross Greer, Russell said: “The options that we have placed on the table are being closed down not because of any actions by the Scottish Government but by the Westminster Government, so in a sense the timetable for what goes ahead now lies with that government.

“If it is prepared to operate in the way that it has promised, and if it is prepared to debate and discuss and to look seriously at where we are going, that will dictate one timetable; if it is not prepared to do so, that will dictate another.”

The answer came after Russell’s statement on Tuesday’s judgement in the Supreme Court which said Theresa May’s Government must pass a law in the Westminster Parliament but also said there was nothing “legally enforceable” to make the Government consult the devolved administrations on Brexit. Russell said that the Sewel Convention that the Scottish Parliament must be consulted on devolution issues must be engaged.

He told members: “The reality is that, up until now, the UK Government has in practice always accepted that a change to devolved competence requires the consent of the parliament. The UK Government’s guidance and this parliament’s standing orders are clear that the Sewel Convention applies where a Bill ‘contains provisions applying to Scotland and which are for devolved purposes, or which alter the legislative competence of the Parliament or the executive competence of the Scottish ministers’.

“Attempts to argue the opposite would overturn – indeed, they are in danger of overturning – nearly 20 years of accepted practice under different political administrations both north and south of the Border.

“That fatally undermines the protections – perhaps on Burns Day I should say ‘the boasted advantages’ – given to the Scottish Parliament and Government in the devolution settlement. It is clear that the Sewel Convention will be engaged by a Bill that changes the law on devolved matters or the competence of the devolved institutions.

“Therefore, once the UK Government Bill is published, and in line with this parliament’s standing orders, the Scottish Government will publish a memorandum setting out the implications for devolved matters and the powers of the Parliament and Scottish ministers.

“As things stand, in that memorandum we will be unable to recommend that the Parliament give its consent to a Bill giving the UK Government the power to trigger Article 50.”

He added: “The Scottish Government has done all that it can to seek compromise and reach accommodation with the UK Government on the terms of the UK leaving the EU. We have recognised that there is a mandate for England and Wales to leave the EU, but there is no such mandate in Scotland.”

He also put questions to the Parliament: “It is becoming increasingly clear that the UK Government’s approach to Brexit is not just about the question of EU membership but about the kind of country that we want to live in.

“Do we want to have our future direction determined by an increasingly right-wing, reckless, hard-Brexit Tory Party that is determined to turn its back on Europe despite the threats to jobs, prosperity, rights and freedoms, or is it better to take the future into our own hands? Is it better that we determine the kind of Scotland, the kind of Europe and the kind of world that we want to live in?”

Later, Leave-voting SNP former minister Alex Neill said: “There has to be recognition and acceptance in the UK Government that although we are, at the moment, one member state, we are four nations and there are four legislatures in the UK. Therefore, if the UK Government wants a successful outcome – as regards the acceptability of the deal to the whole of the UK– it will have to take cognisance of the views of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as well as of England.

“Has the time not now come – because the important point is about where we go from here – for the Scottish government, along with the Welsh government and whoever is representing Northern Ireland, to demand of the UK Government that all four nations and their legislatures should have an inside track in the negotiations?”

Russell replied: “If those negotiations were to proceed without the deep involvement of the devolved administrations, that would be yet another failure by the UK Government, so I take the point on board.

“I hope that it was not only I who was listening, but that the Tories here were listening, the Tories at Westminster were listening – much more importantly, because the Tories here do not influence what is happening – and the UK Government was listening.

“They might do everything that they can to try to divide us in Scotland, but there is a unity of purpose about what we need to have.”