Hansard

I would like to make some progress on this point.

Scotland needs working-age people to settle here in the long term and to raise families here. Our rural communities want to attract families who will make their homes here, but the UK Government’s family migration policy stops people from bringing their families here. It limits the family reunification rights of UK citizens. The “Migration Integration Policy Index 2020” assessed the UK immigration system as one of the least family-friendly migration systems. That UK immigration system was assessed as the second worst of all the immigration systems that it reviewed, in terms of family reunification policies.

The financial threshold rules are a significant barrier, not just for those who are seeking to migrate to Scotland, but also for UK citizens. Analysis by the Scottish Government shows that almost 50 per cent of the Scottish population would fail to meet the financial threshold to allow them to bring a spouse and two children into the country through a family migration route. Those rules force people to choose between their family and living in their home country. The rules do not meet Scotland’s needs and they do not reflect our values.

On a personal level, I note that, as a child of someone who emigrated to this country, I would not be standing in the chamber today if the current UK Government immigration rules had been in place then. I wonder how many others in the chamber and across Scotland would similarly have been prevented from building a future here.

The rules also do not support the needs of our rural communities. There is clear evidence that the current UK immigration system is particularly poor at meeting the needs of those communities. That is not just the assessment of the Scottish Government; it is also the assessment of the UK Government’s Migration Advisory Committee, which stated in its 2019 report:

“the current migration system is not very effective in dealing with the particular problems remote communities experience.”

The solution that was proposed by the Migration Advisory Committee and accepted by the then Home Secretary, Sajid Javid, was

“to pilot a scheme that facilitated migration to these areas, then monitor what happens over several years and evaluate the outcomes.”

That was an evidence-based approach to policy making. Sadly, such an approach did not survive a change in Home Secretary.

However, this Government made a commitment to progress the rural visa pilot proposal. We wrote to the UK Government offering to work collaboratively with it to deliver on the Migration Advisory Committee’s recommendation. In the absence of engagement from the UK Government, we have worked with 12 rural and island local authorities and with rural employers, as well as academic experts, to develop an evidence-based, practical proposal that could be delivered today.

At the moment, the UK immigration system issues visas to people that tie them to a specific job with a specified employer or a specific university course at an identified university, so the notion that a rural visa is inoperable within the current immigration system is simply untrue. The fact that the UK Government’s expert advisory group recommended such a visa is evidence of the fact that such a system could be made to work.

Our proposal, which has been led by my colleagues the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and Islands and the Minister for Culture, Europe and International Development, is based on international evidence of what works. It builds on analysis from the independent expert advisory group on migration and population and it uses elements from Canadian and Australian immigration systems to show how a Scottish rural community immigration pilot can be delivered through a partnership approach.

The pilot would present a distinctly new, community-driven and employer-based migration route. It would offer a world-leading approach to spread the benefits of immigration to our rural communities. Above all, as has been done successfully in Canada, it would be tailored to meet the economic and societal needs of specified communities in Scotland.

The proposal that is included in the motion today sets out how that would be delivered in partnership between the UK Government, the Scottish Government, local authorities, employers and communities. The proposal has been jointly developed by the Scottish Government, local authorities and partners. I will quote just one of those partners. Councillor Paul Steele, the leader of Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, said:

“The Scottish Government’s ‘Rural Community Immigration Pilot’ offers a thoughtful, safe, well-founded option as to how new labour can be streamed to island and rural communities”

to help respond to the issues that are faced. He continued:

“As such I am highly supportive of the proposed Pilot.”

Our ask of the UK Government is clear. If it means what it says when it suggests that its aim is to deliver an immigration system that works for all of the UK, that immigration system has to work for Scotland and for our rural communities.

I will listen closely to what colleagues across the chamber say in the debate, because I am keen, as we try to build partnership with the UK Government, to deliver the pilot. Working with a unified approach would make the proposal all the stronger. I will listen closely to what we hear from the front benches of other parties and I hope that we can work in partnership over the months ahead.

I move,

That the Parliament notes that the Parliament has previously endorsed a motion calling for the development of a differentiated, more flexible migration policy tailored to meet Scotland’s specific needs; celebrates the social, economic and cultural contribution made to Scotland by those who have chosen to live here; notes that the UK Government’s own immigration advisers concluded in 2019 that the UK migration system is not very effective in dealing with the particular problems that remote communities experience and recommended the establishment of a pilot scheme to support migration to rural areas, and that this recommendation was accepted by the then Home Secretary in a statement to the House of Commons in July 2019; further notes the distinct demographic challenges that Scotland faces, and that all of Scotland’s population growth is projected to come from migration; notes that the independent Expert Advisory Group on Migration and Population concluded in its 2019 report that the demographic challenges for rural areas would be exacerbated by the ending of freedom of movement; further notes that the Fresh Talent scheme introduced in 2005 was a differentiated migration approach for Scotland, and calls on the UK Government to accept the Rural Visa Pilot proposal, which has been jointly developed by the Scottish Government, rural and island local authorities and rural employers, and to engage constructively to support the delivery of Rural Visa Pilots that meet the needs of rural communities.