The Scottish National Party leader was launching a consultative blueprint for the road to independence that will form the party’s contribution to a cross-party convention on independence, made up of Nationalists, Greens and Scottish Socialists.

The SNP says that if it wins power at the 2007 Holyrood elections, it will deliver a referendum within its first four-year term asking Scots whether they agree or disagree with the statement that “the Scottish Parliament should negotiate a new settlement with the British Government so that Scotland becomes a sovereign and independent state”.

By tying himself down to a 2011 date for separation Mr Salmond could be hinting that any referendum would have to come sooner rather than later in the first four-year term, although he pointed out it could be a relatively quick process once Scots had decided to back independence. Negotiations for the breakup of the former Czechoslovakia, he argued, took a matter of days.

But the SNP referendum would be one that would be held before negotiations with the Government in London and these talks could easily turn out to be protracted as the 300-year Act of Union was disentangled.

The 28-page document unveiled by Mr Salmond yesterday, Raising the Standard, details the powers that would come from London to a Scottish government in Edinburgh following independence. They cover the powers presently reserved to Westminster.

Mr Salmond has come in for some internal party criticism recently that since taking over again as leader 16 months ago, he has been relatively low- profile and has presided over a poor SNP electoral performance culminating in the party’s failure to win two recent by-elections at Glasgow Cathcart and Livingston.

Allied to that, independence is not the burning issue it was in Scotland pre-devolution. Although one third of Scots say they back the idea, that does not translate into support in the ballot box for the Nationalists. To that extent, yesterday’s launch was a timely return to centre stage for Mr Salmond, although he had to admit tacitly that there were several major obstacles for the Nationalists to overcome before reaching that point of holding their referendum. First, the SNP would have to overtake Labour as the largest party in the devolved Scottish Parliament in the 2007 election, giving it the right to lead a coalition Executive, in partnership with the Liberal Democrats or one or more of the minor parties at Holyrood.

A partnership agreement for such an Executive would have to have an agreement to hold a referendum — something that might prove difficult, for example, for the Liberal Democrats. After that, there would be the problem of actually winning a referendum. Then would come the negotiations. Under the SNP plans, if the Scots backed independence, Westminster would then have to repeal the 1707 Act of Union and amend the Scotland Act 1998 which established the devolved Parliament, to ensure Scotland became a sovereign state.

The document confirms the Nationalists’ commitment to retain the Queen as head of state as long as Scots wanted her.

A separate referendum would also be required post-independence to replace sterling with the euro, according to the document.

It also proposes allowing the continuation of cross-border services, including the BBC, Post Office and Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA), until distinct Scottish arrangements are made.

But key policy powers currently reserved under the Scotland Act by the Westminster Parliament would be given to MSPs at Holyrood.

A declaration of Scottish sovereignty would be drawn up by the Parliament in Edinburgh and, according to Mr Salmond, the following Holyrood elections, in May 2011, would be within an independent nation.

Mr Salmond said: “We will take full control of Scotland’s resources, levy our own taxes and conclude our own international treaties. Our nation will, after 300 years, rejoin the world as an equal nation state. The Scottish Parliament will then have all the powers it needs to make a difference to the lives of the people of Scotland.”

Debates on the pension age, nuclear power and asylum seekers were all being decided by Westminster not Holyrood, despite specific Scottish concerns, he said. Pensions were being debated in isolation of the fact that life expectancy was three years lower north of the border, while new nuclear stations were being proposed without reference to Scotland’s rich renewable energy resources.

A Labour Party spokesman said: “This document does nothing to answer the many fundamental questions about the SNP’s least popular policy. It contains no new ideas or arguments and is a rehash of documents comprehensively rejected time and time again by Scottish voters.”

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