Speeches by Wishart.

“Why is the Secretary of State talking about the Scottish Government?”

“On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker.”

“It is. It falls to me to very humbly make this point of order. What can you, as Chair of the proceedings, do, within your powers, to ensure that we have an adequate debate on what this Bill is about?”

“I have a lot of time and respect for the hon. Lady, and she has contributed so much to the work of this House, but she has been simply absurd in some of her proclamations in the last few minutes. All we are asking for is the opportunity to address some of our workforce issues, because we have a real crisis in Scotland.…”

“I know that fresh talent is exciting and of interest to the Secretary of State, so I give way to him.”

“Just before the shadow Secretary of State gets into his usual anti-Scottish Government stuff, he has told us what he does not like about this Bill moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry (Stephen Gethins). How would the Scottish Conservatives resolve our population demography crisis and the f…”

“May I wholeheartedly congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry (Stephen Gethins) on introducing this vital and critical Bill this morning? I also commend him for the diplomatic and charming way that he always introduces these debates to the House. He was very generous in taking so many poin…”

“I am almost grateful for the intervention, confused and clumsy as it was, because I have a solution for the hon. Gentleman. What we need when we face a crisis, as we do now, are solutions. What my hon. Friend the Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry has offered by starting this conversation is a way to deal with the …”

“I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way. I know that most Labour Members are new to the procedures and workings of this House, but the Secretary of State is not, so he will know from experience that private Members’ Bills are practically rewritten in Committee. My hon. Friend is asking that we be allowed to take…”

“I have been here longer than the Secretary of State.”

“And Perthshire.”

“I wondered how long it would take to get to this point. That is utter bunkum and rubbish. The suggestion started by the Conservatives—but it seems to have been readily picked up by the Labour party—that we are not able to attract to Scotland people from the rest of the United Kingdom is utter rubbish. The figure is at …”

“The hon. Lady shakes her head. She has obviously not read the report. I extoll her to do so, because this nonsense has been allowed to take hold for too long and it cannot continue any longer. We have record net migration from the rest of the United Kingdom. Believe me, Madam Deputy Speaker, we do not get depressed abo…”

“I have no idea what the hon. Gentleman is saying. We are trying to offer solutions. We have identified a range of difficulties that we have as a nation. It is right and proper that they be examined, analysed and addressed. Then we get down to the business of fixing them, and that is what we are doing today. This Govern…”

“Okay. Right, let us look at Scotland’s population then. Scotland’s population is probably in the region of 5.5 million. Some estimates are 5.43 million and some are 5.7 million. We have been in population decline since the latter part of the 20th century. This is an issue that particularly interests and excites me. I t…”

“Absolutely. I was going to come to that, but it is good to look at that now. There are reasons for that, although I am not entirely clear about them; the Committee did not get to the heart of that in its analysis. We live in a United Kingdom and have a massive mega-city, London, so there is always the allure for young …”

“This is helpful, and I think my hon. Friend the Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry was hoping for such positive contributions. I am very much aware of the work that the Migration Advisory Committee does, and I commend it for that, but its list of occupations required in Scotland is not nearly enough—it does not eve…”

“That is such a profound question. I do not know how Labour has got itself into this situation. I suspect it is some sort of fear of Reform, whose Members are not here today, and Labour is probably right to be frightened. I think I saw an opinion poll showing that Labour is now behind Reform across the United Kingdom. L…”

“I have no doubt that the hon. Member is utterly sincere. I have listened to several remarks from his Labour colleagues, and some of them greatly impressed me. It encouraged me to think that there is a little bit of a fight-back. I sat on the Committee considering the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill, and I …”

“I am sorry—I thought I was going to get the figures. We do way beyond our national share when it comes to inward migration, so please let us have no more of this. Let us just agree that people come to Scotland and we want more to do so. Regardless of how successful we have been in attracting people, we are still in a s…”