TOMMY Sheridan has said Alex Salmond would "sweep up the votes" if he stood in next year's Holyrood election as the head of a new pro-independence party.

The Solidarity leader backs the new Alliance for Independence (AFI) party, but said the former FM should stand even if it sidelined other Yes parties.

“I would much rather see him do that than us have the ability to stand,” the former Glasgow MSP said.

A recent poll suggested a new party fronted by Salmond could attract a quarter of the votes on the Holyrood list system, which returns 56 of Holyrood’s 129 MSPs.

The research, conducted earlier this month by Panelbase, also found 40% of those who voted SNP in last year’s Westminster election would either definitely or probably back the new party.

READ MORE: Party led by Alex Salmond 'would win list votes' from Yes supporters

Salmond resigned from the SNP in August 2018 after the Scottish Government held an in-house sexual misconduct into complaints against him made by two civil servants.

He won a judicial review at the Court of Session, forcing the Government to admit the probe was unfair, unlawful and “tainted by apparent bias”.

He was cleared by a jury of sexually assaulting nine women while he was Scotland’s First Minister from 2007 to 2014. He had insisted he was innocent of all 13 charges against him throughout the trial.

Following his acquittal in March he made a statement outside the High Court in Edinburgh saying there was “certain evidence” he would have liked to have presented but for “a variety of reasons” was unable to do so. He added it would see the light of day later.

It is now understood this information will be contained in a written submission the former First Minister will submit to the Holyrood committee set up to investigate the Scottish Government’s flawed handling of sexual misconduct complaints against him.

Since the trial he has been writing a book about his experience which he says will reveal evidence of a plot by Sturgeon’s inner circle against him.

READ MORE: ‘Plot’ to take down Alex Salmond to be revealed next month

The emergence of the AFI, led by former SNP MSP Dave Thompson, is said to be an indication of the impatience in the Yes movement to make indyref2 happen. 

One sign of that impatience is the emergence of the AFI, led by former SNP MSP Dave Thompson, which plans to field candidates on the Holyrood lists to maximise the number of Yes MSPs at Holyrood.

However the SNP has refused to withdraw from the list, and accused the AFI of trying to “game the system”.

Appearing on the pro-independence Scottish Prism podcast, Sheridan said Solidarity had attended the first AFI meeting in February and considered the group had merit, and its first conference in September would be “worth participating in”.

But asked about what would happen if Salmond entered frontline politics, he said there was “no doubt” that all the other small Yes parties would have to “take their tents down and go home”.

He said: “If Alex does that, then the rest of us can forget it, because he’ll sweep up the votes, quite rightly given his reputation for many many years.

“But do you know what? I’m calling on Alex to do it.

“I would much rather see him do that than us have the ability to stand.

“I don’t think us standing is a big deal for the independence movement.

“If nobody else is standing on that particular platform to utilise the voting system, to actually sweep up the second votes that otherwise would go to Unionists, then yes we’ll do it.

“But I would much rather Alex was prepared to do it because he will be more successful at it.”