THE SNP is facing calls to disown its 2014 blueprint for independence after a Nationalist MP warned leaving the UK would require deep cuts to public spending.

The Scottish Conservatives said the Nationalists' White Paper, Scotland's Future, had been exposed as an attempt to "hoodwink" voters.

Holyrood's main opposition party hit back after SNP MP George Kerevan presented a vision of independence which accepted a period of austerity would be required to help balance the books.

Mr Kerevan, part of the SNP team considering currency options for a go-it-alone Scotland, also said public assets would have to be sold off to raise revenue to prop up a new Scottish pound.

His comments were in stark contrast to the White Paper published in the run-up to the referendum.

Based partly on wildly optimistic forecasts of North Sea oil revenues, the document promised an instant £1.2billion giveaway including tax cuts, improved state pensions pensions and more generous childcare.

Writing in business and financial newspaper City AM earlier this week, Mr Kerevan said post-independence budget cuts would be "painful".

However, in a foretaste of how the SNP is expected to present a post-oil crash, post-Brexit case for independence, he insisted the pain would only last five years, after which Scotland would be transformed into an "economic powerhouse".

Scottish Conservative finance spokesman Murdo Fraser said: "When pro-UK campaigners dared to suggest that ripping up the United Kingdom might cause an economic shock, Nicola Sturgeon and Alex Salmond attacked us for Project Fear.

"Now finally George Kerevan has admitted what was obvious all along: separation does come with a cost.

"The SNP should now have the decency to withdraw the fact-free assertions they made in their independence campaign and in their discredited white paper."

He added: "This was a party which tried to hoodwink people into believing that they would be £1000 a year better off after separation. Mr Kerevan has now admitted that was utterly baseless.

"It won't be five years of pain - separating Scotland from the Union would throw up a permanent barrier between us and our nearest market and our closest neighbour.

"It is time the SNP admitted it: we are better off as part of a common Union of nations, working together for the benefit of all."

And SNP spokesman said: "Given everything that the No campaign said about EU membership before the independence referendum, for Murdo Fraser to accuse the Yes campaign of broken promises is pretty desperate hypocrisy.

"It’s thanks to Murdo Fraser’s party that the people of Scotland face being dragged out of the EU against our will, a decision which the IMF say will cost £270m per week, and not save £350m as promised.

"Many prominent No campaigners are reconsidering their position on independence in light of the Brexit vote, but we haven’t heard of many Yes campaigners doing likewise – so it’s little surprise that the Tories are so worried."