There were sharply contrasting scenes in London and Edinburgh last Friday. While thousands of jubilant Brexit backers packed into Parliament Square, outside Holyrood in the Scottish capital a bagpiper played Ode to Joy while EU flags were waved.

For SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon the moment must have been bittersweet.

Brexit offers the Remain backer an opportunity to claim that the terms of the union have dramatically changed. “At 11 o’clock tonight the UK that Scotland voted to be part of in 2014 ceases to exist,” she said.

Sturgeon is making another pitch for independence to Scotland’s overwhelmingly Remain-supporting electorate and one poll this week suggested her side has edged ahead.

On Saturday, Donald Tusk, former European Council president, fanned the flames by saying “everyone would be enthusiastic” in Brussels at the prospect of Scotland applying to join the bloc.

The argument has shifted from whether independence adds up to whether Scotland would be better off in the UK or in the EU post-Brexit.