NICOLA Sturgeon has hit back at Alex Salmond after the former First Minister suggested she lacked urgency on achieving independence for Scotland.

During a question and answer session with members of the Scottish Parliamentary Journalists' Association yesterday, the SNP leader picked up on her predecessor’s remarks made in a BBC interview on Wednesday.

Asked about at criticisms from Salmond and others in the Alba Party and in the Yes movement around the speed at which the SNP have approached the prospect of a referendum given the existence of a simple pro-independence majority since 2016, she said the issue was a matter of timing and circumstance.

The First Minister said: “I think it is nonsense. I heard that yesterday, I heard Alex say he wasn’t sure why I hadn’t moved quicker in the last five years and it struck me, Alex was First Minister for seven and a half years before there was an independence referendum so I’ve still a bit of a way to go before I get to that point.

“We have to respect reality in Scotland. We had a referendum in 2014, we then had the Brexit referendum, we have had a pandemic in the last year, circumstances have to be part of the judgement about when it is right to have another referendum and give people the choice but so too does public opinion have to be a part of that.

“What we have seen, of course, is a growth in support of independence particularly over the last year to 18 months and we now have a position where independence looks to be on a sustained basis the majority position in Scotland.”

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During the briefing she was asked about whether she would work with Salmond after the election if he was returned to Holyrood or if there was a need for her to work with Alba as a pro-independence party.

She insisted she was “fighting to hopefully to win a majority” and added she didn’t think his new party’s approach was “helpful” to independence. On the contrary, I actually think it is a hindrance to that because I don’t think it helps us persuade the unpersuaded and build that sustained majority support,” she said.

Asked to clarify if she would work with Salmond, she said: “I’m ruling out, having any kind of, you know, arrangement with Alex Salmond or with Alba ... But I have no plans, no intention of having any kind of arrangement with Alex Salmond.”

Salmond has said he wants to put previous issues with her government behind him and work with the SNP.

Asked if she would take a call from Salmond if he wanted to discuss independence tactics after the election, she said: “I have a feeling that Alex won’t be keen to pick up the phone to me any time soon.”

Pressed if she would call him about independence if the parliamentary arithmetic demanded it, she said: “No.”

During the briefing she also criticised Salmond's failure to admit the Russian state was behind the Salisbury chemical weapon attack in March 2018 when he was questioned on the issue by the BBC on Wednesday.

The First Minister said was “sadly not surprised” that her predecessor, who has had a TV show on the Russian channel RT since 2017, prevaricated on the issue.

She was asked if she accepted that the Russian state was behind the Salisbury poisonings and what she thought of Salmond’s failure to blame Russia for the attack.

She replied: “In answer to your first question, yes I do. Obviously at the time of that I was privy to some of the intelligence information and briefing. There is no doubt in my mind Russia was behind the poisoning.”

“All right-minded people who value and want to stand up for decent values across the world should say that.”

“I can’t speculate on why Alex or anybody else decides to say, or not say, certain things. I think those questions have to be put to them. But I guess one of the consequences of Alex now leading a different party to the one I am in is I don’t have to explain what he means when he says or doesn’t say things any longer.”

She later told the briefing with journalists when asked about the Salisbury poisoning that she was "not surprised" at her predecessor's stance.

Asked how she felt about that, she added: "Disappointed, because I do think that everybody who thinks they’ve got a role to play in politics, whether i think that is well advised or not, should be mindful of the values of our country and the values we want to project internationally and the reputation of the country internationally.”

“I look at him now and won’t always recognise the person I was close to all these years ago. That’s something I have had to come to terms with over the past couple of years and I’ve probably come to terms with it more now than I have in the past.”