LABOUR is to launch a "regeneration" strategy in Scotland to reach out to around 40 per cent of its traditional supporters who it is thought went against the party line and backed independence in last week's referendum.

The announcement will be made today by Shadow Scottish Secretary Margaret Curran, who will acknowledge the "deep disengagement" that led many traditional Labour supporters to vote to break up Britain. She will seek to reassure them that ­positive change can now come from Scotland being part of the UK.

With a General Election seven months away, Labour chiefs are worried long-standing supporters drifting towards independence will back the SNP in May and at the Holyrood poll in 2016. Yesterday the Nationalists talked up a massive surge in membership of their party, with thousands of people joining since last Thursday's vote.

The first poll carried out after the referendum showed a rise in support for the SNP at Westminster and Holyrood. 35 per cent of those questioned planned to vote Nationalist in the General Election. Support rose to 49 per cent when they were asked their intentions for the 2016 Holyrood vote.

In her keynote conference speech, Ms Curran will announce a tour of the 10 Holyrood constituencies in Scotland with the highest proportion of Yes voters, when she and other senior Labour figures will meet Labour Yes voters to hear their concerns.

Saying devolution remains the settled will of the Scottish people, she will add: "We have to be honest when we look at the results and see that many of the people who think that Britain can't work for them are Labour voters …

"We need to understand more clearly why they are angry and what we need to do about it. We need to understand why in areas like Glasgow, Lanarkshire and Dundee people feel so let down by our country that they want to opt out entirely … The campaign to change Scotland didn't end on Thursday; it only started, and it needs to include everyone."

Meantime, Scottish Labour leader Johann Lamont will tell activists the party must address the "deficit of hope" in Scotland.

She will salute the "passion for change" of independence campaigners and will urge them to "share their energy with us to change Scotland and change Britain and build that society we all seek without borders".

She is expected to stress the shared objective of the Yes supporters and Labour to build a "truly just society where the talents of all can flourish and the talent of none is wasted". Ms Lamont will say Labour "allowed disappointment to become despair and to ferment into Nationalism" and it must never be allowed to happen again.

"The people of Scotland have rejected the false offer of the Nationalists. The deceitful contortion that we could have a Reaganomic tax regime and a Scandinavian welfare state. That Scotland could prosper while throwing away the benefits of the Union we have built with our neighbours over 300 years."

She will add: "But we must do more. We built the Scottish Parliament to address a democratic deficit. Now we must use it to address a deficit of hope because at the end of the day powers to parliaments mean nothing if they don't mean the empowerment of people."