Chamber and committees

There are. Ireland is 2 per cent of the European Union’s population and uses that as a rough rule of thumb for the consequences of what that means financially and in other ways. Ireland is working on the expectation of taking in up to 80,000 Ukrainians. That process has just begun.

At Dublin airport, there are welcome tables from the Irish public authorities that take people’s details. The whole problem with the UK scheme is that it is the wrong way around. The Irish do all the due diligence when people arrive from Ukraine. They take people’s details and then make sure that they can be matched to health provision and local government support. Ireland makes sure that people’s positions are effectively regularised from the moment that they get off the plane.

Ireland is working hard to make sure of being able to provide the housing that will be required. I have already made the point that early indications are that, among the first arrivals are people who have friends, family and relations who they can stay with, but a proportion do not and, in Ireland’s case, those people will have to be matched with local authorities and also religious institutions and other places where accommodation is available. Ireland runs a national portal where people can indicate their willingness and ability to take people in. In addition to people who are friends and family from Ukraine, there are obviously people in Ireland, as there are elsewhere in Europe, and here too, who want to help and take people in. Ireland has a system for that matching process and is expecting numbers to go up quite dramatically.

There is a lot in that question. I, too, have been discussing that with the acting consul general. There are two specific aspects to the Ukrainian community in Scotland.

First, there is a long-settled and long-established Ukrainian community in Scotland that largely goes back to the 1870s and post second world war. In that case, we are already talking about a second or third generation of Ukrainian Scots. They live right across Scotland. There is no geographical concentration beyond the conurbations that we are aware of. For example, there are Ukrainian community facilities in Edinburgh and Glasgow, but Ukrainian Scots are also established right across Scotland. The consul general told me that he thought there were probably up to 5,000 of them.

Secondly, we could add up to a maximum of another 5,000 seasonal workers. Therefore, the figure of 7,000 that Mr Ruskell gave speaks to that 5,000 plus 2,000 seasonal workers. Yes, there will be concentrations of those people in certain parts of the country, and we have to think about that.

During my conversations with Ireland’s foreign minister, Simon Coveney, yesterday, I was interested to hear that the majority of people who are arriving in Dublin are heading towards the address of a family member, a friend or somebody who they know. Again, given the point that I made earlier, unless somebody can tell me that there is a profound difference between people arriving in Ireland and those arriving in Scotland, I suspect that the first wave of people will arrive knowing where their people are. They might well be working in the seasonal industries, but they might also have connections with the established Scottish Ukrainian community as well as people who have been working here for a number of years and also form part of the community, but who do not traditionally move back and forward every year. We need to be aware of that as a phenomenon.

That shows why the Scottish Government has been keen to work on the resettlement scheme that has emerged from the Syrian scheme of which we have good experience at local government level, to make sure that we are able to match public service support for people who are arriving in situ in localities with the levels of demand.

Mark Ruskell might well be right that a significant number of refugees might head to certain parts of the country because of the nature of work that they do. We do not know that yet, which is why we are still keen to make sure that we are working hand in hand with our colleagues in the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, who have been doing a great job in making sure that there is co-ordination right across the 32 local authorities so that we can be aware of what might be coming.

What might be coming are people in their hour of need and I have no doubt that the response that we will see in this country will be the same as we have seen right across Europe—people wanting to be helpful and wanting to be supportive.

I also draw attention to the fact that—I am sure that members also saw this on their televisions—when people arrive on trains in different parts of Poland or different parts of Germany and even across to France, there are people standing in the stations saying, “I will take in two people,” “I will take in four people,” or “I will take in eight people.”. On a human level, that is extremely moving, and I am sure that those who do not have family here would want to feel that they can live in safety with people who can help and support them. Having said that, though, we have to consider safeguarding and be aware of who is arriving and where they are going, primarily for the reasons of matching the social service support that we want to offer.

That all underlines the reason why we want a resettlement scheme that has local government and the provision of local services at its heart. We are ready to do that, our colleagues in local government are ready to do that and we are just trying to impress on the UK Government that, regardless of the route that it opens up and the preferences that it might have for how it operates in other parts of the UK, we are clear that we have good experience and we want to apply that good practice to do the best that we can do.

Do my colleagues want to add to that? In a nutshell, that is our approach thus far. I know that the situation is fast moving, but that is still where our preference lies.

There is that group of people and there are other groups, including people with disabilities, of whom we are very mindful. That is an issue that our colleague Pam Duncan-Glancy raised with me in the chamber last week. We are very seized of the spectrum of needs that people will arrive with.

On the technical question about Ukrainian medical records, I will have to come back to Dr Allan. Ukraine is a developed country that has computerised data management systems. Notwithstanding the fact that it is in a war situation, it has a functioning medical system, and the largest part of the country is not occupied. There must be ways in which information can still be accessed, but that very much depends on the capacity of the Ukrainian health system, which, as we can all understand, is under huge strain because of the injured—civilians in particular but also military personnel—who will be treated right across the country.

I will take that question away, but I know that our health service and everybody who assists in areas such as disability will be very seized of the need to ensure that we are able to do everything that we can to help.

In concert with the situation in all other European countries, there has been a reaction from both the Government and the private sector in Scotland. Some—I would say most—of our leading brands in most of our economic sectors that have had interests in Russia have already announced that they are divesting from Russia, or are no longer continuing to operate there. Committee members will be aware that the First Minister has written to ask that companies or entities that fall into that category consider their positions and divest from Russia.

We all know that the UK, and London in particular, has become a preferred location for oligarchs to park often ill-gotten, massive funds in different legal entities, including some with the name “Scottish” in them but which are Scottish only in name. They have been buying expensive property in London—some have bought expensive property and estates in Scotland. I very much hope that the new legislation will finally—finally—begin to get to grips with what until now has, at best, been tolerating ill-gotten gains being whitewashed in the UK’s headquartered financial systems, using overseas territories, and, at worst, has been understanding that that is happening at scale and allowing it to continue. It cannot continue. It is totally and utterly unacceptable.

Part of the problem for us in our national Parliament, speaking on behalf of our national Government, is that we do not have many of the levers to deal with this. We are dependent on legislation being passed in Westminster. The legislation has catch-all exemptions, which allow people to be exempted from the process on the ground of national security and any other number of reasons.

I am here to talk about the things that we have the power to make decisions on, but I was asked specifically about what we can do in an economic response. I think it is good that the UK Government is finally making some progress on this front, but there is still much, much more that can be done, and we should never go back. It should not be a temporary response to the circumstances in which we find ourselves now. Our company systems should be transparent. Landholding should be transparent. People who have ill-gotten gains should forfeit them, and we should use unexplained wealth orders as much as is necessary. If we are beginning to do that properly on a UK basis, that is to be welcomed.

Following an open tender process in January, we have contracted a consortium of expert researchers to help inform our thinking on Scotland’s future peace offer, which will report back to us in the summer. There has never been a more pertinent time to discuss Scotland’s approach to peace and reconciliation.

It is the long-established convention of this and previous Governments that legal advice is not disclosed, other than in exceptional circumstances. That reflects the public interest in the provision of free and frank legal advice and maintains the right to confidentiality of communications between legal advisers and clients.

All legislation that the Government brings forward will continue to be of the highest standard and open to the full scrutiny of the Parliament.

I am delighted to hear the question. The Queen’s platinum jubilee is a significant milestone and the Scottish Government welcomes the celebrations that will take place across the country throughout this special year.

Jubilee celebrations are commonly community led and Scottish Government officials are ensuring that lord lieutenants, community councils and local authorities are informed of opportunities to be involved in the celebrations.

Forgive me—I do not know whether Willie Rennie came into portfolio question time without having heard my earlier answer, because it has not changed. Rather than reading out the question that he wrote before arriving, perhaps he could have listened to the answer that I gave earlier. I rest by it.

Yes, I agree.

What with the shifting sands of explaining parties in Downing Street, the unknown costs of their union unit—or, as it is now called, the Union Strategy Committee—which are buried within a headline figure of £81 million, and the courts finding their Covid contracts going to party supporters “unlawful”, the lack of interest of Conservative members appears to follow that old adage of, “Do as we say, not as we do.” As is so often the case, the double standards of the Tories help to make the case for independence.