NICOLA Sturgeon has made a late appeal for tactical votes, as Labour sources claimed many of their previous supporters were ending a flirtation with the SNP and returning to the fold.

Campaigning in Edinburgh North & Leith, the First Minister asked Labour and LibDem supporters directly to back the SNP to avoid splitting the "anti-Tory vote".

In a sign of anxiety that some past Labour supporters are drifting back to the party because of Jeremy Corbyn, she said SNP MPs agreed with much of what the UK Labour leader said.

After previously insisting Mr Corbyn was incapable of winning power, the SNP leader also said it was no longer inevitable that Theresa May would retain her majority.

Scotland’s voice “could be decisive” in the result she told activists at the The Shore in Leith.

She said: “I’ve got a message to people across our country who normally vote Labour or Liberal Democrat. I understand your loyalty to your party, and I understand that you do not agree with the SNP on everything, you may disagree very strongly with us on somethings.

“But, I ask you to think about this. A vote or Labour or Liberal Democrats, parties who are in third and fourth position in Scotland risks doing one thing and one thing only splitting the anti-Tory vote and allowing a Tory MP in the back door.

“And to Labour voters in particular, I offer this reassurance. If you lend the SNP your vote to keep the Tories out then you can be assured that you will be electing SNP MPs who might not agree with him on everything, but who agree with Jeremy Corbyn on more than Kezia Dugdale and Scottish Labour agree with Jeremy Corbyn.”

The SNP owed much of its success in the 2015 general election to Labour-Yes voters switching to the Nationalists in the wake of the independence referendum, boosting the SNP’s vote share to 50 per cent and causing a collapse in Labour support.

However Labour sources say the tide is now flowing in the opposite direction, with the party hoping to slash SNP majorities - if not win seats - in Glasgow, Lanarkshire and the Lothians.

With no election due until 2021 after today, Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson said it was a “last chance” to send Nicola Sturgeon a message to abandon a second independence referendum.

She said: “After had so many elections and referenda in the last few years in Scotland this is an opportunity to make this the last one in a long time.

“Nicola Sturgeon wants a referendum in 16 months’ time. We don’t want that. We don’t think the country wants that. This is the opportunity to show Nicola Sturgeon you don’t want that.

“If you lend us their vote at this election, the Scottish Conservatives can stop it. We’re the only party strong enough, from the Borders up to Banffshire and back again, that can actually do it.”

Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale said the country was “in touching distance of a Labour government - and people across Scotland need to get out and vote for it.

“Send Nicola Sturgeon a message to drop her plans for a divisive second independence referendum. A vote for Labour today will tell Nicola Sturgeon to get back to fixing the mess she has made of our schools and hospitals.

“A vote for Labour will also deliver a government led by Jeremy Corbyn for the many, not the few, including a £10 living wage, £3bn for public services in Scotland and an end to austerity.”