Chamber and committees

I do not dispute the importance of infrastructure, although, as I have mentioned, housing is also important and is an issue that people in some of the other parties are less keen to engage with.

However, is the member not overlooking something major? Does he agree that one of the major reasons why people used to come from many European countries to live in rural Scotland was the freedom of movement that we used to have? If we are not going to have freedom of movement across Europe in the way that we did as a member of the European Union, we will have to create something else that works, but there is currently nothing that is attracting people from other European countries to live in rural Scotland in the way that they once did.

I begin by thanking Kate Forbes for bringing to the chamber a debate that has a striking relevance to my constituency. As she mentioned, the census figures show a population drop of 5.5 per cent in the Western Isles in the space of a decade, and I note the future figures that she referred to. Those figures might be stark, but they are not surprising. We are now at a crossroads. The very existence of some communities as places where children grow up and people work is now in question.

I will take Harris as an example. Last week saw the phenomenal and much-awaited launch of the Hearach—the first whisky from the Isle of Harris Distillery. In passing, I note that the work and vision that have gone into that island enterprise are now quite rightly being celebrated. However, of course, all businesses need a workforce, and nearly every local business that I speak to is struggling to find staff. The local authority is having real difficulty in providing care for elderly residents. Harris—whose population has halved since the 1960s—simply needs more people, and, as I have mentioned in the chamber before, the on-going challenge across the Western Isles to the traditional concept of a house as a year-round dwelling is a major part of the problem.

There is no single answer, but, with fewer than one birth for every two deaths in my constituency, there is no solution that does not involve bringing more people to live and work on the islands. To illustrate the scale of the challenge, I draw members’ attention to the fact that the Outer Hebrides community planning partnership identified the need for inward migration of 1,000 working-age and child-bearing families to keep the islands’ workforce anything like sustainable.

In such a situation, we should not shy away from any available avenue. Immigration has the power to keep public services, industries and communities sustainable. I can think of local businesses that successfully attracted workers from eastern Europe. Those workers put down roots and, in many cases, their children have grown up speaking three languages. However, since Brexit, the UK Government’s approach to immigration is simply not working for Scotland—certainly not for rural Scotland.

We know from the Migration Advisory Committee that rates of international inward migration to islands and remote rural areas are less than a fifth of what they are to our larger cities. Communities are crying out for a bespoke rural visa scheme to encourage inward migration to those areas. We know that that works successfully in other countries, such as Canada, with its Atlantic immigration programme. The proposal has been endorsed by Scotland’s local authorities, business groups and Parliament. I remember putting the proposal to the UK Government when I was Minister for International Development and Europe. However, if the UK Government had any appreciation of Scotland’s distinctive demographic needs at that time, it did a good job of being undemonstrative about it.

Unfortunately, the necessary powers lie not with this Parliament but with another—one with an obsession with net migration and hostile rhetoric. If we are to create a wealthier Scotland—a Scotland that can meet the needs of its industry and public services and properly tackle depopulation—we need a tailored migration system. Communities in the Highlands and Islands need one sooner rather than later. Therefore, I hope that all parties will commit themselves either to providing rural visas to Scotland or to devolving the necessary powers so that Scotland can provide them herself.

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. There is something wrong with the wi-fi in this corner of the chamber. I would have voted no.

Yes.

I want to ask a wee bit more about the question of duplication in the code. Do sections 2 to 4 of the bill place any new legal obligations on buyers and sellers? I think that Gilly Mendes Ferreira touched on that. Are we dealing with something that is purely advisory or will people have new obligations as a result of it?

Regarding unlicensed litters—I am building on the point that Karen Adam made earlier about one-off litters—is there a need for a sort of de minimis provision that recognises the difference for low-volume breeders or, on the contrary, is there a need for more regulation of low-volume breeders?

I think that I know what a register of unlicensed litters is, but, to many people out there, there will be an inherent contradiction in the idea of registering someone who has not licensed themselves. How do you do that? I think that I know what it means, but can you understand why, to many people, it seems a strange idea?

A number of you have identified problems with how the trade operates. Will you say a bit more about whether the code is the answer to that and whether it will have a potentially deterrent effect on people who are responsible for bad practice?

On a technical point—this is perhaps for the Law Society but perhaps for others—the bill sets out, to an extent, what the code should and should not contain. Is that normal practice in legislation? Does anyone have comments on the approach that the bill takes to that?

I must make progress given the little time that I have.

The Scottish Government has taken many significant steps to support expectant and new parents. Those steps have been alluded to today. Quite rightly, the vast majority of the 5,000 babies who are admitted to neonatal care each year will continue to be treated in their local neonatal units and postnatal wards. I therefore say respectfully that I am not sure that questioning the expert clinical advice of those who were involved in producing the best start report—which is, in effect, what some are doing today—is a helpful way forward. Nor do I believe that making undeniably difficult decisions, which the NHS has to make, in the context of highly charged political debate would be entirely helpful when compared with the other option of listening to clinical advice.

Presiding Officer, you might reasonably ask why a member from the islands is talking about neonatal care in Lanarkshire. However, as members from other parts of the country regularly mention my constituency, as is their right, I make no apology for occasionally straying across the Minch. Before I say anything else, however, I recognise the authoritative and heartfelt contributions that were made by Mark Griffin and Keith Brown, in very fine speeches.

The fact is that the provision of neonatal care is an issue across Scotland, and I am acutely conscious not only of the excellent work that hospitals in my constituency do, but of the many mothers who, for various reasons, already make very long journeys away from their families to have their babies in larger hospitals on the mainland, and have done so for many years.

I am happy to take this opportunity to acknowledge that University hospital Wishaw has provided an extremely high standard of neonatal care. Countless parents are grateful to staff there for supporting them through some of the most challenging, joyful or heartbreaking moments of their lives. The neonatal unit at Wishaw will continue to provide that support and care for parents and babies in the future. The key change, as others have mentioned, is that the most premature or unwell babies will now be cared for at specialised intensive care neonatal units. As others have set out, that model of neonatal intensive care was recommended by the best start report and it was based on clinical evidence that care for babies at the highest risk is safest in units that can treat a higher number of patients. Meanwhile, neonatal units in Dundee, Glasgow, Kirkcaldy and Kilmarnock, as well as Wishaw, will continue to provide neonatal care for their populations.

As a rural MSP, I am in favour of localised healthcare provision wherever it is possible. However, where the expert advice calls for specialist units, it is crucial that patients and their families are fully supported to receive care where it is felt to be clinically most appropriate. Keith Brown alluded to the fact that ensuring the best possible outcomes for patients must be the priority.

The best start report, which was published in 2017, listed 76 recommendations as part of a five-year programme to improve maternal and neonatal services in Scotland. The Scottish Government accepted all those recommendations, including the establishment of a new model of neonatal intensive care. Within the model, the most preterm and the sickest babies will receive specialist complex care in three main centres. That approach is based on evidence showing that babies who are cared for within that kind of framework have improved outcomes.