Chamber and committees

I have a supplementary question to Mark Ruskell’s comments about access to buses. The COSLA paper includes statistics on the number of people already in Scotland through other asylum and humanitarian schemes. I just wanted to add a human touch. Last week, I met Ukrainian people who had come to Scotland, and one of them told me that, in Ukraine, the cost of a bus trip is the equivalent of 10p in Scottish money. There is a cultural and financial gap for them, which I think is making people quite anxious.

Thank you.

I reiterate that it would be much appreciated if we could get answers to some of those questions, because they are now issues, not future issues.

Highland Council is looking for clarity on funding of the supersponsorship scheme. There is a list of issues in the submission from COSLA, and it would be really good to get a set of answers on those. For example, it talks about the fact that host councils do not have the capacity to arrange transport for matches to be put with their hosts, and there is not a model elsewhere in the UK for doing so. Where we are volunteering and we need to come up with new schemes, that all needs to be done urgently, because it is not happening at the moment.

I am in strong agreement with that stand with Ukraine sentiment. I can tell that your having been across to Poland and seen the reality on the ground has had a personal impact on you.

My questions are about how you are monitoring the supersponsor scheme. What does success look like for you? The feedback that I have had and the submissions that we have had from representatives of different organisations, such as JustRight Scotland, COSLA and Glasgow health and social care partnership, indicate that there is a real gap between our collective ambitions and the capacity of local authorities to deliver.

What monitoring are you doing on the impact of people being stuck in hotels for weeks before they are linked up with a sponsor? We got feedback from the consul general that there is a particular issue for women with children, for whom being stuck in a hotel is totally wrong. I have also picked up the particular issue that, when people get stuck in a hotel, the roots that they put down are with the Ukrainian support community, which makes it even harder once they are given an allocation if it is not in the same area because they have already put down roots and have support.

What are you doing to speed up the matching process? I would like a comment from you about people being stuck in hotels. The experience of the Afghan and Syrian communities is that people are still stuck in temporary accommodation, which causes huge issues for access to schools, health services, post-traumatic stress disorder support and, particularly, NHS dentistry. Hosts have got in touch with me who are really worried about the Ukrainians they are trying to support. They are asking who they should contact because it is hard to get those links on the ground.

That is a useful commitment. To be specific, Highland Council said:

“The lack of funding instructions from SG prevents the Council from planning ahead for this resettlement scheme.”

My second question is about that need to plan ahead. When I visited the Ukrainian community last week, I heard of someone who has been given their two months’ notice for leaving their sponsor, because it is a six-month scheme. We are not just at the point of matching people with their supersponsor—in the next few weeks, people will start to come to the end of that six-month period. What is being done to think ahead?

Before I ask my next question, I declare an interest in terms of my former employment and as a Lothian MSP, on account of the lack of affordable social housing in Edinburgh, which is already a huge issue. What work will be done not only in the medium term but in the short term to address that issue of accessible housing? The consul general talked about temporary accommodation and the fact that people fleeing from Ukraine would tolerate slightly lower standards of housing, but we have our own health and safety standards. What will be done to get those people access to social housing and to get longer-term placements for people so that, in particular, women with children can get their kids stable and settled and can access employment and things such as post-traumatic stress disorder support?

Regardless of how enthusiastic people might be to get back to Ukraine, we know that, for many of them, not only have their homes been bombed but their whole community has been eradicated. Where are we going to put people up and what can we do now in terms of access to affordable housing so that they can make their home in Scotland, even if it is only for one or two years? The hosting process does not tick that box, so what is next? What are you doing?

That is very useful. I just wanted to get that on the record. Having met people who support Ukrainians, I was aware that there were active discussions on doing that to ensure that those experiences are not lost and that there is accountability in future. Thank you for clarifying that.

It is good to see you. I want to follow up on questions about support from the local community. I have visited the Ukrainian support network, and it is really impressive to see what it is doing on the ground to provide food, advice and even clothes—many people have come with just one small bag, so they are rebooting their lives. What really struck me was meeting two psychologists who had just started supporting people.

My question is about the support that people are getting once they arrive, not just from the Ukrainian community in Edinburgh, which is clearly really strong, but in other parts of Scotland. Are there networks that people can tap into? Is the support mostly in Edinburgh and Glasgow?

It is good to get on the record those points about change that could make a big difference. On your point about transport, lessons could also be learned from the work that has been done on transport in Glasgow and Strathclyde.

I have a follow-up question for Coree Brown Swan about that issue of different levels and relationships. You talked interestingly about relationships and agreements in Canada and the cross-border and intergovernmental work that is done there. Will you say a little more about that? That could be a way of strengthening the impact that we could make. I am thinking about intergovernmental work, but I am also focusing on interparliamentary work. Do you agree that there is a potential role for, say, the metro mayors to change the dynamic at the centre so that it stops thinking about running things and acknowledges multilevel Parliaments and Governments?

I, too, thank you for the submissions that we received in advance. It has given us a bit of depth when looking at the alternatives.

To broaden out the discussion about interparliamentary work, we briefly heard from Dr Anderson about horizontal relationships, which are not factored in or formalised, the scope for doing that in the UK and for learning from other countries. I am thinking about the horizontal relations between the UK Government and the devolved Governments and between those Governments and local government, so it is about acknowledging that multitier set of relationships.

To kick off, can you say a bit more about where we are on that, Dr Anderson? We have met the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee—the UK Parliament’s constitutional affairs team—and we have met the House of Lords team that is looking at constitutional change, and it feels as though there is an appetite for change. The issue is thinking through what priorities to push in terms of interparliamentary and intergovernmental relations, so that you do not miss out that potential radical change that could solve some of the challenges.

On one level, civil servants have longevity—they might be there longer than the politicians—but on another level, ministers get reshuffled and the composition of Parliaments change. Parliaments have greater stability through committees, as well as through cross-party links. It is interesting to consider how to make that work going forward.

Dr Brown Swan, you made some comments about the memorandums of understanding. Will you say a bit about how those have worked? We had not had them for that long before Covid came along. Are there any lessons from the past couple of years about what we need to accelerate to make them work better?