Nicola Sturgeon’s push for a second independence referendum caused SNP voters to switch their allegiance to the Conservatives and there is little appetite among Scots for a new vote, a senior Nationalist has claimed.

Pete Wishart, the SNP’s longest-serving MP and chairman of the Scottish affairs committee, warned that a new vote against independence could set the movement back decades and pleaded for “pragmatism” in deciding whether to hold another ballot.

The first minister said last year she wanted to hold a new referendum by early 2019, only to abandon the timetable after the SNP lost a third of its Westminster seats, and 500,000 votes, at last year’s general election. She has promised to update parliament this autumn on the next move in her independence