Ian Murray

I have said already that net migration has to come down. That is the view of the Prime Minister and this Government, because it is too high. The reason it has to come down—this goes right to the heart of some of the big issues in Scotland that the SNP Scottish Government do not want to talk about—is that nearly one in six young people in Scotland are not in education, employment or training. We have shipyards in Scotland that build the very best ships in the world, employing Filipino and South African welders who look from the top of those ships into some of the poorest communities in Scotland and the United Kingdom, where a huge number of young people are not in employment, education or training. We need to do something about that. That is why net migration has to come down. Workforce and skills planning is a much more important way to tackle skills shortages. We have been leaving businesses unable to find the skills they need in the UK reliant on workers from abroad. That is the record of the previous Conservative Government. Let me say it again: net migration is too high, and the interaction between migration and skills in the labour market is fundamentally broken. All those organisations read out by the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry in support of his proposal also say the very same thing. Skills in the labour market is broken, and the link between migration and skills in the labour market is fundamentally broken. That is why we need confidence in the whole system, and that whole system needs to be fundamentally rebuilt. That is the UK Government’s focus. We will face these challenges head-on by delivering on our missions in Scotland by kick-starting economic growth, which has been a disaster under the Scottish Government. If Scotland had grown at the same level as even Manchester, the Scottish economy would be tens of billions of pounds larger. If the city and region of Glasgow had grown at the same level as Manchester, its economy would be £7 billion larger. Kick-starting economic growth is therefore a key driver for this Government, as well as making Britain a clean energy superpower, in which Scotland will play a key part, and of course tackling poverty. I set out my Department’s priorities in Scotland during a recent speech at the University of Edinburgh. Given the relevance of that to the debate’s subject matter, let me draw on some of the points I made then.