NICOLA Sturgeon is being urged by the co-convener of the Scottish Greens to help spearhead a new mass grassroots Yes campaign.

Maggie Chapman said it was essential the First Minister got involved in re-energising the movement and assisted in attempts to build support for independence across Scotland in the months ahead.

She called upon Sturgeon to meet with the Scottish Independence Convention (SIC) which Chapman said is working on a number of initiatives to increase support for self-rule.

“The convention is a cross-party and non-party collection of people who support independence.

As First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon has an important role to play in the movement,” Chapman told The National. “I’m sure over the coming months we will work with her and she will wish to work with the SIC. Its strength is as a broad-based movement not affiliated to any one political party.”

Chapman added she believed the SNP and the broader Yes movement should reflect on the way Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has been able to galvanise support among young voters by articulating left-wing policies.

Corbyn’s commitment to raising income tax for people earning more than £80,000 a year was popular with many younger voters at the General Election, as well as those on middle and low incomes.

“We have a lot of work to do, but there are a lot of people who want to get involved and build the movement again,” Chapman said.

“For me, this is far more important than 129 MSPs. We need to engage people in every community in Scotland. One of the things Corbyn has been able to do is to mobilise many of the younger generations, by articulating policies that are based on social justice. I would urge everybody in the SNP to be aware of that, and for there not to be a triangulation to the right.”

Chapman added: “To me, one of the things we can see from the Corbyn campaign is that there are policies on the left which appeal to future generations and that’s what we need to work on and to deliver.”

Chapman’s comments came the day after the First Minister set out her thinking on the timing of a second independence referendum.

Speaking in Holyrood, Sturgeon said she would not bring in legislation immediately to hold a new ballot, but will wait until the terms of Brexit were clear, probably after autumn next year.

The development was criticised by Chapman’s fellow Greens co-convener Patrick Harvie, who said the timetable would mean Scots would be the only people in Europe not to have a say on Brexit before it happens.

During her statement, Sturgeon also underlined her belief that the arguments and movement for independence need to be strengthened. She said: “Many of us already believe independence is the right and the best answer to the many, complex challenges we face as a country – and also the best way to seize and fully realise our many opportunities.

“The challenge for all of us who believe that Scotland should be independent is to get on with the hard work of making and winning that case – on all of its merits – and in a way that is relevant to the changes, challenges, hopes and opportunities we face now and in the years ahead.”

The First Minister then acknowledged the need to work across parties and beyond party politics. “We will engage openly and inclusively with, and work as part of, the wider independence movement,” she said. “We will seek to support, engage and grow that movement, and build the case that having decisions made by us – not for us – offers the best future for our country.

Former justice secretary Kenny MacAskill is among an increasing number of senior figures in the SNP who have spoken of a need for fresh momentum from grassroots activism.

Writing in The Herald, he described the SNP’s UK election campaign as “lacklustre, and said: “Publicity and social media are important but grassroots organisation remains fundamental. Activism on the ground, not just in cyber space, is needed.”