First Minister Alex Salmond faced a grilling in Dundee yesterday as he sought to woo Scotland’s trade unionists into backing independence.

The SNP leader got a mixed reception as he addressed a gathering of the Scottish Trades Union Congress, with answers sought on everything from tax to wages ahead of September’s historic referendum.

He promised there would be no disruption to occupational pension schemes and won murmurs of approval from the hall when asked whether his government would back continued public ownership of the London-to-Edinburgh East Coast Main Line and whether he could rule out compulsory redundancies in the civil service following a vote for independence.