The former leader of the Scottish National Party, Gordon Wilson, has said the issue of gay marriage could stop people voting for Scottish independence.
He claims marriage equality is "peripheral" and that focus was better spent on winning a majority in an independence referendum.
He made the comments during Newsnight Scotland, last night.
"Every vote lost through alienation on this issue is a vote that could be lost on the referendum itself," he said.
"The worry for me, apart from the issue of same sex
marriage not being compatible with marriage itself, is that from the SNP
aspect with a referendum coming, they are busy alienating voters and
it's not the time to do it.
"It's never the time to do it in politics, but certainly not
on the eve of a major event like a referendum on independence which is,
or used to be, the main aim of the SNP."
"It's a peripheral issue in
terms of the demand - where there are only 3,300 civil partnerships in
six years compared with 175,000 marriages. They're not doing anything to
aid the doubtful cause of political correctness."
Wilson, a staunch Christian, also said that heterosexual couples could decide not to get married because they regard it as "tainted", the BBC report.