Labour’s shadow Scottish secretary, Ian Murray MP has said an independence referendum is not the priority of the Scottish people at the moment.

Speaking to Sophy Ridge on Sky, the Edinburgh South MP said: “The important thing to realise from these elections, which is critical for all sides of this debate, is that Scotland is completely split down the middle.

“In terms of the constituency vote pro-independence parties just fell short of 50% and on the regional list just got over 50%, so Scotland is completely and utterly split down the middle.

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“The First Minister promised this election would be about Covid recovery and we will be holding her to that, and if she brings a bill to parliament about a referendum when she promised it would be about Covid recovery we will certainly not support that.

“What we’re doing and what our MSPs will be doing when we come back to parliament on Thursday is having a sole focus on what everyone promised in this election, which is Covid recovery, that’s the priorities of the Scottish people and that’s the priorities of our MSPs when they go back into that chamber, and it should be the priority for everyone, and both the UK and Scottish government have to work together to make this work, otherwise Scotland and the rest of UK will be much diminished.”

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The MP acknowledged that Labour also needed to respond to their election results in England - saying that losing Hartlepool was "a disaster".

He said: "We have got to respond now to what communities are telling us."

"We have got a problem in the red wall."