Chamber and committees

As we have heard in the debate, language is incredibly important. We need to ensure that we are talking about the same issues and that we are using the correct terminology. Not doing so perpetuates the misinformation that some seek to weaponise against individuals and communities.

Presiding Officer, can I clarify that Meghan Gallacher is taking my intervention from earlier?

My intervention was to ask whether you could give an indication of any constructive proposals that you have put forward to ensure that regular and safe routes are provided.

I will press on. I will take the intervention later if I have time.

I would like to remind members of a few facts. People who are seeking asylum cannot access local authority housing. The asylum system and its operation are the responsibility of the UK Government. The UK has international legal obligations to recognise refugees who are in the UK, and the purpose of the UK asylum system is to determine whether someone who is in the UK needs protection in line with those obligations. It is only once the UK Government has made a determination to grant asylum that newly recognised refugees have the right to access housing, work and other publicly funded support. As the cabinet secretary made clear, using the term “illegal migrant” is not only divisive and dehumanising but inaccurate.

I will now turn to some of the contributions and reflect on as many of them as I can. First of all, I emphatically reject the use of the term “assimilation”. That has connotations of people having either to mask themselves or to mimic in order to fit in, instead of enabling cohesive multicultural communities. The days of ethnic minorities with strange names having to change their name in order to anglicise and disguise themselves, and of young Asian and black girls having to bleach their skin in order to fit in with white communities, should be condemned and put into the history books. I reject the term “assimilation”.

We also heard about the willingness to tear up the ECHR in order to demonise further an already vulnerable group. It seems that there are members among us who would willingly throw away the rights of every citizen and person in this country in order to demonise further people who are already vulnerable. The ECHR is a fundamental principle of this Scottish Parliament, and any MSP who is worth their salt will resist derogation from it in the strongest possible terms.

I will also look at the facts. In 2024, the UK had around 948,000 long-term immigrants, primarily through work and study visas. Of those, 108,138 claimed asylum, of which 35,000 arrived via small boats. That is just 3.7 per cent of the total number of long-term immigrants in 2024. It is important to remember those numbers.

We recognise that the current UK Government inherited a broken asylum system, a backlog in decision making and large asylum accommodation estates. People are stuck in that system, which reduces their ability to integrate and to be able to work.

The bottleneck in decision making is the direct result of the UK Illegal Migration Act 2023, which is a totally unworkable and unconscionable piece of legislation. It was never supposed to work; it was an attempt to control the headlines in an election year. In the same way, these debates in the Scottish Parliament are not supposed to improve homelessness; rather, they are an attempt to lower the bar of what is considered acceptable rhetoric in the run-up to next year’s elections. The Scottish electorate can see right through that. People are organising in their communities to stand up to the demonisation of people seeking asylum, and I have every faith that they will overwhelmingly reject that premise at the ballot box.

I urge the chamber to reject this inaccurate and disgraceful motion. This Government will uphold Scotland’s values of compassion, dignity and respect, and it will protect all our communities.

No—

Has Meghan Gallacher or her party engaged with the UK Government to release the resources that are required to support everybody?

[Made a request to intervene.]

Our population strategy sets out our ambition that Scotland is the ideal place to raise a family, where people are enabled to have the number of children that they wish to have. It is not for Government to dictate or influence whether people should have children, which is, rightly, a matter for individuals. The ministerial population task force continues to consider fertility trends, and we are engaging with the United Kingdom Government on its parental leave and pay review to ensure that any new provision supports working families in Scotland.

I share the member’s interesting views on our changing demographics. Falling birth rates are a trend across many high-income countries, with, as the member said, significant implications for our economies, communities and public services. We are committed to learning from other countries. In December 2024, the ministerial population task force considered potential international lessons from family-friendly policy interventions.

We are currently exploring next steps in the Scottish context, including scoping further research into the role of parental leave uptake on decisions to have children. From our 2022 attitudes to family formation research, we know that childcare is an important factor in people’s decision to have children. Through our addressing depopulation action plan, we are funding local authorities in depopulating areas in the Western Isles and in the north-west of the Highlands to scope and deliver, where possible, childcare interventions that support families to live and work there.

I acknowledge that campaign, which people continue to talk to me about. Through my portfolio, I have the pleasure of meeting many faith and belief groups, older people’s organisations and disability networks, and they all express to me the point that in every aspect of our society people are feeling the rise in negative rhetoric. I am listening carefully to those groups. Although they, rightly, challenge the Scottish Government to show visible leadership and give a strong, clear and consistent message on cohesion and protecting our communities, my challenge to everybody is to fulfil their responsibilities and their leadership roles—in their organisations, on the streets with their neighbours and in their communities—and make sure that we treat people with compassion and kindness. That is how we can counteract division.

The funding will support conversations about the difficulties that people are facing because of rising food bills. We must ensure that we deal with misinformation and realise that the challenges faced by different parts of our community are actually challenges that we all face and that we have more in common than what separates us.

We want to support organisations that bring local communities together to tackle exclusion and division. The additional funding stream will support grass-roots organisations working across shared interest areas such as sport, health, wellbeing and cultural activities, bringing communities together to build trust and connections through meaningful dialogue and engagement. We want to support activities that unite and that deliver outcomes that can benefit everyone, regardless of their background.