NICOLA Sturgeon is being pressed to use the new Brexit delay to hold indyref2 in the next six months.

Chris McEleny, a former candidate for depute leader of the SNP, has called on the First Minister to give voters north of the Border the “opportunity to voice their preference on the future they want for Scotland”.

The Inverclyde councillor’s comments came after the leaders of the remaining 27 EU countries agreed to extend Article 50 negotiations by six months, pushing the Brexit cliff-edge back until Halloween.

His call was repeated by long-serving SNP MP Angus MacNeil, who urged Sturgeon not to delay a second Scottish independence vote.

READ MORE: Tories call for May to go as Brexit delayed until Halloween

McEleny said: "With an extension to the end of October, we now have the clarity that people required. People in Scotland should be given the opportunity to voice their preference on the future they want for Scotland.

"Before the UK leaves the EU it is now time to press with everything we have to give the people the opportunity to decide of they want Scotland's future relationship with the EU decided for them or if they want to take that decision into their own hands by deciding that Scotland should become an independence country.

"An independence referendum in September of this year would give us that opportunity."

MacNeil, meanwhile, said that although Theresa May had persuaded European Union leaders to give the UK more time to agree on its departure process, the SNP must not follow suit.

The MP tweeted: "The #Brexit can has been kicked down the road again ... ..we cannot follow suit by kicking the #indyref2 can behind it."

Sturgeon is expected to update the country on her plans for a second independence referendum in the coming weeks, once the “fog” of Brexit has lifted.

READ: Nicola Sturgeon's full letter to Theresa May after fresh Brexit delay

Last weekend, Scottish Green party co-convenor Patrick Harvie warned the First Minister of the “real danger in waiting too long on the hope that clarity, which may never come, is just round the corner”.

“To pass legislation for a referendum takes some time. If we wait too long, that won’t be doable in this current session of Parliament,” he told the Herald on Sunday.

Asked if he wanted another independence referendum before 2021, Harvie replied: “If this Brexit process is happening, I would like to see it.”