THE SNP MSP Keith Brown has criticised the “hostile” nature of the debate on immigration encouraged by the Tories, Labour and Reform UK during a debate on Channel 4.
Keith Brown, who also serves as depute leader of the SNP, said the anti-immigration rhetoric being fostered by other parties did not serve Scotland’s interests.
He featured in the debate – titled The UK Decides: Immigration, Law And Order – alongside Tory candidate Chris Philp, Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth, Reform UK’s Richard Tice, LibDem Daisy Cooper, the Green Party’s Carla Denyer, and Labour candidate Nick Thomas-Symonds.
During the debate Tice suggested that the UK should “pick people up” from small boats crossing the Channel and return them to France.
He said: “If you give people the right to work, then that will increase (small boat crossings).
"This is an utterly depressing conversation. It does not serve the people of Scotland or the UK. “Immigration should be an economic benefit. It should be fair and rights based - Labour and the Tories chasing Reform is not the way to go" @keithbrownSNP #VoteSNP #Channel4debate pic.twitter.com/zJeOpft0ei
— Tom French (@tomfrench85) June 18, 2024
“What we’ve got to do actually is we’ve got to pick people up out of the boats and take them back to France, that will stop the deaths. That’s the compassionate thing to do. That will stop the illegal trade.”
However, Brown hit back and extolled the virtues of immigration and the beneficial impact it can have on the economy.
“I think this is an utterly depressing conversation,” he said.
“It does not serve the people of Scotland, certainly, and I would argue the people of the UK.
“Immigration can be an economic benefit. That’s the way we should look at it. It should be fair, it should be rights-based.”
Presenter Krishnan Guru-Murthy then allowed a member of the audience to ask the panellists a question on the subject.
Audience member Lily Lloyd-Smith asked how the politicians would “combat the hostility that’s directed towards migrants right now”.
Brown said: “First of all you have to stop the rhetoric. We’ve seen hostile rhetoric, we’ve seen chasing people around in vans around the streets of London and telling them to go home.
“We won’t have that in Scotland. I was lucky enough to host a Ukrainian family that came as refugees.
“One is now working in a vital job in the ferry infrastructure, one is working in a supermarket. They’re additions to our country.
“They pay tax, they contribute. That’s the way we should be looking at immigration.”
He added that while Scotland did not face an issue with small boats of migrants arriving on the coastline, it was exacerbated by the Tory government’s “cutting off” of legal immigration routes.
“You have to have a complete rethink on immigration,” he said.
“And, honestly, the Labour, Tory, chasing Reform votes is not the right way to go”.
Later in the debate a refugee from Afghanistan told the party representatives that asylum seekers had been “scapegoated and dehumanised”.
Asked if he felt ashamed about the lack of compassion in the conversation on migration, Tory candidate Philp said: “Frankly, I’m not.”
He added: “This country, the United Kingdom, is generous-hearted and open.
“So when there was the crisis in Syria when Assad was murdering his own people, we set up the UK resettlement scheme, we directly and legally and safely resettled 25,000 people from Syria and from refugee camps on Syria’s borders into the UK.
“That was the largest legal resettlement scheme in relation to Syria. I’ve mentioned Ukraine already, 200,000 Ukrainians have been welcomed here to the UK, a similar number of people from Hong Kong, fleeing oppression by the communist regime.”
But Brown said the Tories and other parties were guilty of demonising refugees “non-stop”.
“I’m very proud that in Scotland we’ve done more than our fair share in terms of both Ukrainian asylum seekers and Syrian refugees as well,” he said.
“But I’m very interested in your own experience in Afghanistan, because I think what the UK did in Afghanistan was utterly appalling.
“The people they left behind had acted as intelligence support, and various other forms of support, and I say this as an ex-service person myself, was utterly atrocious, betraying those people that should have had safe flight back out of Afghanistan, very dangerous and to say, given the roles that they played.
“And I absolutely agree with your point that they demonise them non-stop. That’s why these problems come and why are they wanting to demonise them? Because there’s other stuff they should be doing – the big parties – they’re not doing, so they go after scapegoats and it’s easy to go after refugees and it’s wrong.”
