Ian Murray

We are concerned about the higher education system in Scotland at the moment, and this Government will do everything it can to support it. Let us work through that particular point, because it is important. The main driver for Scottish universities being in the place they are is the funding model they have been forced into having. It caps Scottish students going to university. That means the universities are completely and utterly underfunded, so their business model has had to reach into international waters to bring in much greater numbers of international students to balance the books. That model is completely broken if those international students decrease in number for a whole host of economic and other reasons. We end up in a situation whereby the whole financial issue is completely and utterly broken. To show the sums of money we are talking about, Edinburgh University is not in deficit—and it is important to say that—but it will be if it does not take action, and the deficit will be £140 million. That is a direct result of the Scottish Government’s funding of higher education. Beyond that, the Migration Advisory Committee has also noted that the scale of migration needed to try to address depopulation would be significant, but that Scotland’s labour market needs are broadly similar to those elsewhere in the UK. The committee has highlighted in its work notable similarities and differences within nations and regions of the UK, and its ambition is to produce an analysis that is localised, but as rigorous as possible. We look forward to seeing that. However, the committee’s geographic focus has at times been limited by the reliability or availability of regional data. It will work with stakeholders to improve the geographical migration data they use, with a view to enabling greater improvement in localised insights. Beyond this Bill, the proposals of the party of the hon. Member for Arbroath and Broughty Ferry in recent years include an expanded skilled worker visa for Scotland, a bespoke Scottish visa, a Scottish graduate visa and a remote rural partnership scheme. In relation to a Scottish rural visa pilot, the Migration Advisory Committee has noted that both Australia and Canada have place-based immigration programmes, but it is suggested that these schemes may not be a long-term solution to rural depopulation. We heard from the former Chair of the Scottish Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Perth and Kinross-shire, that depopulation in Scotland has been a century long and therefore any scheme will not be a long-term solution to that kind of rural depopulation.