Ian Murray MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  With GB Energy, and indeed with the green revolution going on across the globe, my ambition is not just that Scotland will play a part, but that it will win the global race. It is well placed to do so, with first mover advantage. The things this Government have done—setting a mission for clean power by 2030, setting up and capitalising GB Energy and having a National Wealth Fund—are all part of making sure that Scotland wins that global race, and of creating the jobs of the future.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I do not think we can determine birth rate issues through the welfare system. The hon. Gentleman is essentially saying that people are choosing not to have larger families because of the welfare system. The fundamental problem of depopulation in Scotland has been around for 100 years—he mentioned that himself—but he sits on one small part of the welfare system to try to make a point that is not relevant to the debate.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I think I have used the debate positively. I have spent a long time talking about our skills agenda, our plan to make work pay, GB Energy, the national wealth fund, economic growth and Brand Scotland. All those things are very positive and have been delivered in the first few months of this Labour Government. If the Scottish Government had the same focus on delivering for the people of Scotland as we have down here, they would be in a much better place.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Thank you for your guidance, Madam Deputy Speaker, but the important point is that immigration and skills are completely linked. If the education system is broken and the skills system is broken, the SNP reaches for a Bill like this one, rather than reaching for the levers at the disposal of the Scottish Government. I speak from experience. A working-class person looking to get on in life needs the security of a house, the opportunity of a career and someone to believe in them. During the pandemic, thousands of working-class kids were sent a clear message by the First Minister that he did not believe in them. For our part, to tackle skills shortages, we will focus on investment in jobs, infrastructure and public services by upskilling resident workers and tackling economic inactivity. We will reduce the reliance on international recruitment to fill roles. We will have a shortage occupation list that includes specific occupations and sectors that are required in our national interest and for our economy. In addition, the UK Government want to engage with bodies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland that are responsible for skills matters. That work is under way and will link directly to the Migration Advisory Committee, the Industrial Strategy Advisory Council, the Department for Work and Pensions and, of course, Skills England from an English and Welsh perspective.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  We should not rerun the Brexit debate in this House, but it is worth acknowledging that the Bill is written in a different way from what the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry wants to deliver. He wants to pretend that it will go to Committee, and we will all sit around the campfire with marshmallows and decide on a wonderful way forward, but that is not what the Bill says. My hon. Friend gets to the heart of the problem, because ultimately this is all to do with the advancement of the Scottish National party’s independence agenda. Nothing else gets them out of bed in the morning. I get out of bed in the morning to try to make sure that everybody in this country, including in my constituency, has better lives and better opportunities. SNP Members get out of bed to push for independence. That is the difference. When the Division bells rang on that occasion—I remember it very well—everybody thought that the vote would be carried. Those SNP Members sat on their hands and the vote was lost by six. All their credibility in trying to push something else through was completely shot at that moment—and do not forget that they also pushed for the 2019 general election at the same time. I will now canter through page 2 of my speech. It is important for us to work together to ensure positive integration outcomes and improved processes overall. Let me turn to the valuable contribution that workers from overseas make to our economy, our public services and national life throughout the United Kingdom. As the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry has highlighted, the remote parts of Scotland face depopulation issues, and they have for a long time—I talk to my hon. Friend the Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Torcuil Crichton) about this on a regular basis. Skills shortages also remain across Scotland, as they do in different places across the UK. Indeed, according to the latest population projections from the National Records of Scotland, the factors driving population change are exactly the same across the whole United Kingdom.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I know SNP Members do not like us speaking about the Scottish Government, but the Migration Advisory Committee that they have talked about a lot in this Chamber already is addressing these issues. They challenged me to tell them what this Government were doing in relation to this Bill and migration in the Scottish context, and I am telling them what the Migration Advisory Committee is saying in response to this Bill. [Interruption.] SNP Members do not want to talk about it, but I will continue to talk about it until health in this country improves, and I have to say that when one in seven of my constituents are on NHS waiting lists, I will continue talking about it until these lights go out. Non-migrant populations would have the same problems as the rest of us in terms of inadequate health services, the declared housing emergency, a broader lack of investment in skills and training, and economic opportunities for young people. The one element in common among all these proposals is they are designed to provide a means to avoid or lower the salary requirements that apply to skilled worker visas. The Migration Advisory Committee has repeatedly advised against salary variations as they could create frictions for workers moving around the UK and could risk institutionalising areas as being low wage. This could have the effect of entrenching low pay in some areas for the resident populations as well as migrant workers, which would do nothing to resolve the long-term causes of depopulation. I am very proud, as is everyone on the Government Benches, of our Make Work Pay commitment and our new deal for working people. Having different salary thresholds for different parts of the UK would also add complexity to an already complicated immigration system and would create difficulties for employers who operate across multiple regions of the UK, potentially requiring them to monitor the physical location of their employees and report that information to the Home Office to ensure compliance. Of course we are aware of the demographic and labour market challenges faced by certain areas, sectors and industries, but we have seen record-high net migration levels in recent years while depopulation has remained an issue for Scotland, suggesting that immigration is not a solution to those challenges, especially given that we cannot practically compel people to stay in a particular area indefinitely. Instead, we are taking action through a joined-up approach across Government, in the UK’s immigration, labour market and skills system, to train up our own home-grown workforce, end the over-reliance on international recruitment and boost economic growth in every single part of the UK. At the same time, the Government have confirmed that the changes made to key visa routes earlier last year will remain in place to drive levels down further. Additionally, as we announced last November, shameless and bad employers that flout UK employment laws will be banned from sponsoring overseas visas, as part of tough new action to clamp down on visa abuse and prevent the exploitation of overseas workers. I hope that the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry and his colleagues will give us their support in Scotland to ensure that workers are not exploited by rogue employers. Let me turn to skills and migration. The Government recognise and value the important contribution that overseas workers make to our economy and public services throughout the United Kingdom. As the hon. Gentleman has highlighted, remote parts of Scotland face depopulation, and skills shortages remain at their highest levels across Scotland. However, those issues have not been solved by the increase in net migration in recent years. Indeed, many of the actions needed to fix Scotland’s skills shortages are already devolved matters under the control of the Scottish Government, so his SNP colleagues in Holyrood already have the levers they need to address those challenges. They may wish to try pulling some of those levers—perhaps he can do so himself, because he wants to be a Member of the Scottish Parliament. Indeed, I think a high proportion of his colleagues think the same. Maybe that is why the leader of the SNP in this House, the right hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Stephen Flynn), has already disappeared to go back to Scotland and make the case for his selection. Let me just run through some of the levers that the Scottish Government could pull. They include powers relating to business rates, social security and tax; the record settlement of £47.7 billion, which is £4.9 billion more than before; and, of course, responsibility for education, health, housing, and employability and skills. They do not want to talk about any of those things. Businesses and unions consistently tell us that they worry about the skills gaps in Scotland. I am surprised that SNP Members do not care about this stuff. This is not just about skills and jobs; it is about opportunities for young people. Perhaps they do want to talk about it, because they all want to go to the Scottish Parliament and to refocus on what they are delivering. The UK Government are focused on delivering outcomes and securing the future through our plan for change. Simply put, young people in Scotland—whether in work or seeking work—are not being supported with the skills and training that they need to succeed. Scotland’s rate of economic inactivity remains above that of the rest of the UK. I am not shy about repeating this: nearly one in six young people in Scotland are not in education, employment or training. Some 1,351 young people in Scotland left high school last year with absolutely no qualifications—an entire high school-worth of young people written off with no future because the Scottish Government refused to do something about it. I am very proud that this UK Labour Government have relentlessly focused on getting people into work and developing their skills by increasing the national living wage and legislating to make work pay; strengthening workers’ rights and protections; providing £240 million for the Get Britain Working plan, which will overhaul jobcentres with a focus on skills and careers; and delivering a proper industrial strategy, developed in partnership with businesses and trade unions, to ensure that we get the economy, and the people in it, working. However, the Scottish Government also have a huge role to play, and they must use the levers that they have. As I have said before, I want co-operation between Governments to drive our economic growth, and skills are central to that. I hope that the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry, his party and his colleagues in Holyrood will engage with all that work and replicate its focus in their programme for government next month, which I think is their fourth or fifth in four years—every other programme for government so far has been an abject failure. I would be particularly interested to see further work on skills and education, building on the work of the Withers review, because right now the SNP Government are failing on skills.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Absolutely, and the biggest grappling that we have to do as a Government and a country is resolve the disconnect between immigration, skills, opportunities for young people and the way in which our economy works across every single part of the United Kingdom. One of the Migration Advisory Committee’s key concerns about some of these schemes is the efficiency of any rural visa, primarily the ability to incentivise migrants to remain located in rural areas after any visa requirements to do so lapse, especially given that the UK is a geographically much smaller country than Australia or Canada—and I mentioned the issue with regard to Quebec. Migrants moving to rural areas would be subject to the same factors driving non-migrant populations to relocate, such as inadequate health services, which is right at the top of the agenda in Scotland.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I stand corrected, Madam Deputy Speaker. It was an even longer contribution, at 50 minutes, and the hon. Member was still not honest about what the Bill does. The Bill before us today devolves the entirety of the immigration system to Scotland.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Immigration is wrapped up in a lot of policy areas that are devolved to the Scottish Parliament. The Scottish Government themselves, in Parliament, declared a housing emergency. Does the hon. Gentleman think that the lack of housing in Scotland has anything to do with the inability to attract migrants to do the jobs in the places where they are needed to do them?

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  rose —

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I am happy to give way. Can the hon. Gentleman intervene less angrily than he has in the past?

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend very much—I hope Hansard heard that. I did say that the attractiveness of Scotland as a place to live and work is down to policy delivery, and let me mention one policy in particular.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. All the Scottish National party debates that I have seen in this Chamber since I was lucky enough to be elected in 2010 have been predicated on independence. There have been no positive debates about what we can do to make things better for people in Scotland, increase economic growth, create skills and opportunities for the future, tackle inequalities in health or close the attainment gap. Those are all failures of the Scottish National party, but SNP Members do not want to talk about them. I am sure you do not want me to continue to talk about them either, Madam Deputy Speaker.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  This UK Labour Government are determined to reset our relationship with the European Union, have a much closer trading relationship and do what is in the UK national interest. The biggest impediment to growth in the economy in Scotland is the SNP Scottish Government, and that has been proven through time.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman asks why and I will tell him. The number of college places is at its lowest level in a decade, with more cuts on the way; the attainment gap between the richest and poorest continues to grow; and, disgracefully, thousands of pupils left school last year with absolutely no qualifications, as I have said. That cannot be allowed to continue. This is nothing new. Was it not the current First Minister who lobbied for tax breaks for private schools, whereas this Labour Government ended tax breaks for private schools?

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I was in the north-east of Scotland yesterday, in Buckie, turning on one of the largest offshore wind farms. Ocean Winds employs 45 to 70 local people from a 40-mile radius from Buckie. That is the kind of opportunity there is. Most of the people in Ocean Winds were from the oil and gas sector. There is no disagreement about the challenge, which is about how we transition a world-class, highly skilled workforce from an industry that is declining because of the age and maturity of the basin to the new opportunities and industry. There is no doubt that the green revolution is one of the biggest economic opportunities this country has had in generations, and we need grab hold of it. I also met Offshore Energies UK yesterday and had very productive discussions its representatives about Government policy and the consultation on the North sea transition. Those discussions will obviously continue. These issues—as I have laid out, based on the National Records of Scotland—are not unique to Scotland, nor have they been solved by the increase in net migration in recent years. The Bill would not address the issues that the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry has raised, because the reasons that the resident population moves away from an area will also encourage any migrant population to follow suit as soon as they are allowed. The former Chair of the Scottish Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire, mentioned Quebec. I have tried to have this checked—if it is slightly incorrect, I will write to the hon. Gentleman—but when I was in Quebec back in 2013, it had introduced a particular social care visa because it had a particular social care problem. It had to scrap that visa, because after the end of the two-year restrictions, everyone moved to other parts of Canada to work. Most went to Alberta to work in the oil and gas sector. That is a key point about having a different system from the one that is part of those net migration figures.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I sat on the Scottish Affairs Committee when it was chaired by the hon. Gentleman and produced one of those reports on migration and depopulation in Scotland—I think it was during the 2015 to 2017 Parliament —and I remember that one of the conclusions of the report was that the biggest type of migration out of Scotland was 19 to 26-year-olds migrating to the rest of the UK. We never answered why.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  We have not yet examined this in any great detail in this debate, but defence and our national security are huge issues. We heard a bit about boat crossings; nobody wants to see those. We want to smash the gangs and stop the crossings. One person crossing by small boat is one too many, because they are putting in danger their life and the lives of others, and that has to stop. There is a huge defence and national security issue here, because the small boats crossings are run by criminal gangs in Europe and on the streets of constituencies all around the country. The answer to the question my hon. Friend just posed is not in the Bill. This is a short Bill to devolve the whole immigration and asylum system to the Scottish Parliament. The Bill does not actually say what it will do. I have no doubt about the honesty and integrity—and any other word we might pluck out of the sky—of the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry, but we cannot take the Bill at face value. He says, “Pop it into Committee and everything will be wonderful,” but we do not know the implications of his Bill. If he wanted to, he could have brought in a Bill that addressed that point.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I agree with my hon. Friend. Look at the money that was wasted for the national care service—again, just another headline in the newspapers that the SNP required in the run-up to an election. It also wasted £680 million setting up Social Security Scotland and wants to put in place a new immigration system that will not require checks, any money, or a border between Scotland and England. The key thing here, which SNP Members do not want to admit and which they voted against, is that this UK Labour Government just gave the Scottish Government the largest settlement in the history of the Scottish Parliament—£4.9 billion more—and there is still a social care crisis in Scotland. That tells us all we need to know about where they spent the money. If SNP Members want to pop up and tell us where they have spent it, I am sure that the Scottish people watching this debate would be pleased to hear from them. It is important to address the underlying issues in a sustainable way and investigate other levers to encourage people to stay, such as boosting attractive job opportunities, affordable housing, which we have discussed, local services, transport link connectivity and suitable local infrastructure. This could include investing in the area or offering taxation incentives to individuals and businesses to do so, as we are seeing with some of the initiatives going on in Scotland at the moment. I acknowledge the consideration that the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry has given to Scottish visas and his views on them, but a separate Scottish visa or a separate immigration system are not things that the Government are currently considering, nor have we asked the independent Migration Advisory Committee to consider them. That is a straightforward Government policy.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Maybe it was 41 minutes.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  If my comments fall out of scope, Madam Deputy Speaker, I would be very happy for you to tell me, as you have the right to, and as you do so well; I will then change my remarks. However, the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire spent three quarters of his rather lengthy contribution talking about the same issues that I am addressing. He may want to reflect on that.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  Absolutely, and I hope that my hon. Friend would say that this contribution from the Government Dispatch Box is a very good use of the Government’s time.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  And the consequence is that we would require checks in both directions. As the Minister for Independence—did my hon. Friend know that the Scottish Government had a Minister for Independence?—clearly said, as we have heard, that a hard border would be required in particular cases. Scottish Ministers, incidentally, have just awarded themselves a £20,000 pay rise—certainly not on the basis of their performance. It is important to acknowledge the complexities of immigration as a cross-cutting policy area. SNP Members do not want to talk about it as a cross-cutting policy area, because many of the policy areas around immigration are devolved to the Scottish Government. This is not simply about numbers. It covers issues of social cohesion, as we heard this morning, economic stability and public services. Ensuring we have a fair and properly managed immigration system that takes account of those complexities is a priority for this Government. We have made clear that the immigration system we inherited is not working. Indeed, the previous Government, which the shadow Secretary of State served in, said that the immigration system in the UK was broken. Under the previous Government, between 2019 and 2024, net migration almost quadrupled, heavily driven by a big increase in overseas recruitment. I have the net migration figures here, and they have been a key part of the debate. In 2023, the net migration figure for the United Kingdom was 906,000. If there was a proportionate share of that net migration going to Scotland, then the immigration to Scotland would be somewhere in the region of 80,000 to 85,000. Indeed, it was below 60,000, so a huge number of net migrants who are coming to the UK are not going to Scotland. The big question has to be why. We had a huge tirade from the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry about Brexit and its consequences, but those lower figures are still higher than before the UK left the European Union. The big question has to be asked: why are people not going to Scotland to work and live?

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  I am tempted to say that Scotland is not a region but a country, but I will not go down that rather juvenile route. The clear point is that the No. 1 priority and mission of this new UK Labour Government is economic growth, because we require it in our communities. If the hon. Gentleman is saying that everything is rosy in Scotland, he should go to his communities and see whether he thinks that is indeed the case. There are lots of wonderful opportunities in Scotland in terms of economic growth, and we should be exploiting those to create the jobs and careers of the future. That is a key part of what we should be talking about. It is clear that levels of immigration need to be reduced. The Prime Minister has also been clear that we will not be introducing an arbitrary cap. This issue will not be resolved by gimmicks, unlike what we see from Opposition parties. It is simply not enough to cap numbers. Without a joined-up approach, our economy will be left without the skills it needs to grow. By creating a fair and properly managed system, we will reduce net migration back down to sustainable levels. We will achieve that through the hard work of tackling the root causes of reliance on overseas recruitment, not through gimmicks such as arbitrary targets. We want to ensure that businesses are helped to hire domestic workers first. We will ensure that different parts of Government draw up skills and workforce improvement plans in high migration sectors. When the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry introduced his Bill, he challenged the Labour Government on what we were actually doing. Let me just read our manifesto to him, because actually it reflects much of what he was asking for, but that is not what his Bill wants to try to achieve. It states: “We will strengthen the Migration Advisory Committee, and establish a framework for joint working with skills bodies across the UK, the Industrial Strategy Council and the Department for Work and Pensions. The needs of our economy are different across the regions and nations, and different sectors have different needs. Given skills policy and employment support are devolved we will work with the Scottish Government when designing workforce plans for different sectors. This will ensure our migration and skills policies work for every part of the UK.” It also states: “The next UK Labour Government will also ensure that UK-wide bodies are more representative of our nations and regions, this includes representation for Scotland on the Industrial Strategy Council, and Scottish skills bodies working jointly with the Migration Advisory Committee.” Before the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry pops up and says, “Well yes, but who is on the Migration Advisory Committee?”, I refer him to Professor Sergi Pardos-Prado, professor of comparative politics at the University of Glasgow. He was recruited to the Migration Advisory Committee because of his knowledge on migration-related issues in devolved areas. All of the accusations laid by the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry through his 51-minute speech have been completely dispelled by the manifesto and the actions of this Government already.

• 25 Apr 2025 · Devolution (Immigration) (Scotland) Bill · Hansard source

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  May I begin by thanking all Members for their contributions, and the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry (Stephen Gethins) for bringing the Bill before us today? I am slightly confused, after his 42-minute contribution, about what he is actually promoting. He seems to be suggesting that the Bill should pass and go into Committee, and then he will invent another Bill to do different things. The Bill before us, which is what we should be debating, is a short Bill that would essentially remove immigration from schedule 5 to the Scotland Act 1998 and devolve it wholly to the Scottish Parliament. As I have said before, if nothing is in schedule 5—