INDEPENDENCE is the love that dare not speak its name, according to a leading figure from the Yes Scotland referendum campaign of 2014.

Colin Fox, Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) national co-spokesperson, was one of the most senior non-SNP voices in the Yes Scotland campaign. He claims the movement is now facing a crisis due to what he says is the SNP prioritising its position as the party of government over the promotion of Scottish independence.

The former SSP MSP believes that the omission of independence as a term by the SNP is fast becoming what socialism was in the Labour Party when the party moved to the right in the 1980s under Neil Kinnock's leadership and Tony Blair in the 1990s and 2000s.

He said: "The modern SNP is more interested in power than independence."

Fox, who was an MSP from 2003 to 2007, claims the SNP had barely raised the issue of independence in the run up to the UK 2015 General Election and during this year's Holyrood election campaign.

"The SNP did not make the case for independence at the elections in 2015 and 2016. It's like independence is the love that dare not speak its name," he said.

He claims that the independence movement has lost momentum and is at risk of waning unless the SNP leadership addresses critical economic arguments such as currency and pensions.

He said: "The independence movement is looking for a lead and should be consolidating its position, but instead is in retreat."

Fox added: "The case for independence has got to be made again and again given the attacks there have been over issues like oil prices.

"But the SNP has not been doing that and independence is subservient to the interests of the party. It seems to have forgotten that the purpose of the SNP is to win independence rather than having have power for its own sake."

The former Lothians MSP went on to claim that the SNP's recently launched summer independence initiative had failed to deliver any post-Brexit vote bounce and said that the demonstrations held to mark the second anniversary of the referendum had been poorly attended.

Fox said: "The SNP's summer initiative on independence was a damp squib and the party is all over the place.

"At the recent rallies the SNP was not present. The central charge is that the SNP sees that its purpose is to be in government, not to promote independence."