 I think that we are all settled. Well good morning everyone and welcome to the Scottish Parliament and the Festival of Politics and thanks for coming along to this particular session where we are going to be covering navigating migration. It is a panel that has been organised in conjunction with the Scottish Parliament's cross-party group on migration, which I am the convener of. We are going to discuss with our esteemed panellists the realities and difficulties and challenges of migrants, asylum seekers and refugees in Scotland today, particularly as they negotiate their right to work, study and live in this country. We are going to do an hour of discussion and then after an hour we are going to move on to a Q&A session. Hopefully we will stimulate conversation and questions so if you can hold your thoughts till the end in the last half an hour then we will come to the room and we can open it up. Also just to let you know that we are live streaming today's session on Scottish Parliament TV so just so you know. So if there is anything particularly problematic that you would rather not be broadcast or whatever, I do not know. Just so you are aware. So there we are. So without further ado I just want to introduce our panellists. We have got Graham O'Neill, who is policy manager for the Scottish Refugee Council and we have also got Pinar Aksu, who is human rights and advocacy coordinator for the Merrile integration network in Glasgow. We have got Karen Goodwin, who is an investigative journalist and co-editor of the Ferret, which is a co-operative collective of journalists working on some pretty intensive investigative journalism in Scotland. We have got Andy Searle at the far end there, who is the co-founding partner and legal director of Just Right Scotland. It is like a pro bono legal champions for people who otherwise would not necessarily get the representation that they ought to get in this legal system. We have got a lot to unpack today and we have got a very short period of time to do it. I think we are just going to look at generally the landscape legislatively in the UK at the moment. In the last year we have seen pretty alarming developments in the settlement migration landscape with the passing of legislation such as the Nationality and Borders Act and the Illegal Migration Act. So just really to open up the discussion in the context of the current legislation that has been passed, how can we mitigate the impact of these law changes on people seeking asylum in Scotland? I might want to start with Andy, if you might want to set the scene on that one. Yes, sure. I suppose the best place to start would be given a wee brief summary of what the latest piece of legislation that just passed says. The Illegal Migration Act effectively abolishes the asylum system in the UK for everybody who entered the country after the 20th of July, so just a couple of weeks ago. It expands powers of detention in the UK, it mandates removal from the UK without ever hearing of the stories that people have fled and the persecution they have experienced. It targets victims of trafficking in the UK by stripping them of the support that they would ordinarily receive here in Scotland through safe houses, therapeutic support, legal support, and it also gives the Home Office the power to remove children from Scottish local authority care into Home Office hotels so that they can be removed from the country as well. So, the bill is the act, I should say, is really punishing. It's changed the game, so to speak. As I said, it does, in effect, abolish the asylum system for most that would use it here. So, there's a lot of things I think that the Scottish Government and the Scottish Public Services and the people of Scotland can do to try and mitigate this. I think community opposition is where it starts, letting those in power know that that is not something that is aligned with our values and are fair enough. We can open up that discussion, thank you. Have a discussion about that for sure. I think that there are mitigations that can be put in place around the use of detention facilities. There are mitigations that can be put in place around trying to continue to support victims of trafficking where we can. I think there are mitigations around Scottish Government's ending destitution strategy because the bill is very likely to increase destitution and homelessness within Scotland. I think that the Scottish Public Authorities and statutory authorities need to really carefully understand how they can continue to discharge their duties to protect children and accompany children in Scotland as well, especially where we know that there's going to be evidence of exploitation, neglect and harm as a result. So, there's a few different things that the Scottish Government and the Scottish Public Authorities can look at and we would encourage them to do so. Thanks very much for that. In Pinar, I just wondered if you could come in to offer a view of some of the people who are involved with the Mary Hill integration network and some of the practical implications some of these legislative changes would have on people on the ground in somewhere like Glasgow? I think that one of the things that comes in with the illegal migration act and also previously with the policies that we had is, since the pandemic, the fact that people have been accommodated at hotel accommodations throughout the country. I think that that's going to increase in a level that rural communities are not going to be able to have the resources and the support mechanisms to provide the essential needs in terms of sporting people. The impact that we're going to see and we are seeing is huge, especially on the impact on people's wellbeing and mental health. For those who don't know when somebody is seeking asylum, the process of receiving a positive or a negative decision could be a lengthy process, so some people could receive a decision within months, but in our cases we have members who have been waiting in the process for years and years. That has a huge impact on people's wellbeing and mental health. I think that we're going to see much more increase on that. One of the reports that we worked with in partnership with Poverty Alliance was the impact of asylum process on people's wellbeing and mental health while navigating the process. I think that the impact on the local community is going to be huge, because of the lack of resources and some communities receiving people in hotel accommodations where they are not aware of what it means to be an asylum seeker or all they are seeing is a hotel accommodation and they are just seeing that people are being accommodated there and they don't have the resources to provide the support. The thing that in Glasgow, the lucky thing we have is there are support mechanisms in place, so organisations like ourselves, SRC and so many others across the city, we are able to provide that support. One thing that we are also facing at the moment is uncertainty, uncertainty in terms of how this is going to impact on the people and also on the local community and at a wider society as well, the long implications of this, of the Illegal Migration Act and many others as well. So we are very uncertain of how that's going to look like and it's something that we are trying to navigate at the same time. But in terms of for the people, like I said, it's a huge, it's a very stressful process and we had a recent discussion where we talked about the new act and people are unsure and unclear of what is happening and I think that's been reflected within the policies and throughout when the Illegal Migration Act was being discussed was uncertainty about how is this going to be impacted on people's life? Is it actually going to work? Is it not going to work? What is going to happen to people who are already in the asylum process who has been waiting for such a long time? Is that issue around backlog going to be solved? How is that going to be solved? So there's a lot of uncertain questions and uncertainty within the sector, I would say. Well, thanks for that insight. Graham, I just wondered if you could open up some of the issues around this backlog that Pinar mentioned because we've seen an unprecedented number in the system of people seeking asylum and waiting for their claims to be processed. Twenty years ago there was a similar spike in numbers but we didn't see the same issues in terms of accommodation pressures and so on. What's changed and what sort of areas can we actually practically affect in Scotland in regards to this issue of accommodation in particular? Thanks a lot, Paul. Welcome everyone, it's really nice to be with you all. Before I do that and I will link around to that, I just wanted to start with maybe putting a bit of context around what Andy started with. Here we are in the UK, one of the states within the global north in the world, very rich state, lots of inequality issues but actually quite a rich state. As Andy said, three weeks, four weeks ago, we've abolished the right for people from countries like Iran, Afghanistan, Syria, Sudan, Eritrea, all countries known for systemic human rights abuses. We've abolished the right of people who are arriving maybe necessarily from destine routes because there is no safe and legal route for people to come across to the UK territory and claim asylum, the UK government stubbornly refused to do that. So those people now will not be able to claim refugee protection. The refugee convention flowed out of... Well, we can debate that, sir, in a second and maybe later on any questions. Would you please be quiet until the end? I don't appreciate heckling. Excuse me, sir, be quiet. I will tell you now, you will be quiet until the end. It's the chair's prerogative. I'll tell you, sir, you will be quiet in this room until the end when you're invited to. That's the protocols which this Parliament observes. We do not tolerate heckling in the chamber of the Scottish Parliament amongst elected members. We certainly don't tolerate it amongst... Well, you will because I'm the chair and if you aren't prepared to appreciate that, then you will be invited to leave, okay? Yes, well, if you don't mind, would you like to leave or would you be quiet? You've got a choice. Well, I'm afraid you don't have a choice on the matter, sir. You either be quiet and respect the people who have came here to listen to our speakers and the people who have been invited to come here and you will listen respectfully and then we will invite you to comment and issue a question. Yes, it is earned. It is earned at the ballot box by people who are elected to represent this country. So, what I'm saying to you now, sir, is you will be quiet and you'll respect the room and you will then be invited to a comment. I don't care whether you respect me or not, frankly. I think it's probably about the stage you're welcome. It's about time you left, sir. Right, well, you'll now be escorted from the premises, unfortunately. It's a great pity you have so much disrespect for when the room has came here to listen to people. Yes, it is earned. Well, I tell you what, sir. If you want to earn respect, then I suggest you stand for election and we will see who earns the respect of the people of this country at the ballot box. That's the nature of our democracy. In our chamber at the Scottish Parliament, we certainly won't tolerate heckling from a sedentary position. It's just to say that the UK State a few weeks ago has walked away from a life-saving international law, the refugee convention. You know, this is the legislation which flowed out of the international community's revulsion at the horrors of the holocaust. It can hardly have more profound origins than it has. So I'm saying that to try and convey the gravity of what the UK State under the concept is. Right, that's it. I've said to you, I've said to you, I will not tolerate interruptions on this procedure. So, yeah, it's a big deal, basically. And to hopefully try and segue it into Paul's question, we've had over the last ten years, especially in the last five years within the UK, a systemic devaluation of the person's right that comes to seek asylum in the UK to actually have that decision on their case in a reasonable timeframe. So what we've watched within the refugee sector is a ballooning of people being held in limbo conditions. And we all know at a psychological level that uncertainty is often one of the most torturous experiences for people, not knowing what's going to happen so you're not able to get your mooring psychologically into your future and start to plan. And what's been happening in the UK when people talk about the asylum decisions backlog, I think they need to centre our analysis on people's experiences and what that does to people in the human psyche and the ability to plan in their future. So a few years ago, about five years ago, the backlog was, I mean, I don't know the exact figures and one sense it doesn't really matter, but you know, it was low tens of thousands people waiting for an asylum decision for six months and more. It's now people waiting for an asylum decision, it's about 170,000 people across the UK, over 100,000 of them waiting six months and more, many, a big portion of that have been waiting over a year. So that's a real waste of people who want to be able to have certainty in their lives and make decisions about their futures. And if the UK state, as it has just done, has walked away from the life-saving refugee convention, and that will cause immense suffering as Andy and Pinar have already articulated, then what it also will be doing is reflecting the political devaluation of the right to asylum within the UK. So the backlog is also a symbol of that political devaluation. They've just not invested practically in decision makers, they've not invested in the process and all the while people suffer. But it's not just about devaluation from our perspective at Scottish Refugee Council, we've also witnessed some very powerful vested interests within commercial companies. So you have Cerco, you have G4S, you have Clear Springs Ready Home, you have the Mears Group, who are working to what the Home Office have put down as a commercial contract, and as commercial companies they need to make a profit. They're under obligation to try and make a profit. So what we've also witnessed is the asylum decision making backlog is excellent business for these companies. As is having an accommodation centre regime, detention regime within legislation, that's also excellent business for these companies. So this isn't just a story of low politics, in their view, low racist politics, often against people of colour within the asylum system. This is also a story of high end profitability and commercial interests within these companies. And we should always remember that in other states in the world, including in the UK as well, commercial companies can have very subtly an imprint into what legislation is passed. And we don't think it's an accident, we certainly think it's worth interrogation, that one of the reasons we have an asylum decision making backlog is that it's good business for the companies. Now I'm not saying to be clear that they're perpetrating it, but what I am saying is that the companies making dough in are maybe happy within asylum decision making backlog. Not the front line workers within these companies, but perhaps some of the bosses within these companies and maybe more specifically the institutional investors that put money into these companies, because they want to have a return for the money that they've put in. I think that's a very interesting point, Graeme. And Karen, this kind of feeds into another issue, which is the public discourse and the framing of often quite emotive debates, as we've already seen this morning. It does stimulate quite aggressive discussion. How do you feel the public discourse reflects some of these realities? Do you feel that it adds to public service? Do you feel that it is covering for ulterior motives? How do you feel this public framing of issues like barges, hotel accommodation often being described as saving the taxpayer money, et cetera? Do you feel how this framing is working as effective? Sure. I think the framing is really interesting and very much at the heart of what has been considered an asylum crisis. And I think a lot of these kind of moral panics start with an essential truth, and that essential truth is that there is an asylum crisis and then you will debate what that crisis might be. For a lot of people that crisis is about human lives, it's about people who are suffering at very sharp end of systemic failures, but what it's being framed as by Conservative Government and allies, of course, is a crisis in terms of the public purse, is a crisis in terms of stopping the flow of migration. So you see a lot of really powerful forces come into this. It's interesting to hear Graham just reflecting there on the kind of disaster capitalism that goes hand in hand with these type of moral panics, but you've got people who are making money in lots of ways in this space, so you've got people like Lee Anderson, for example, this week, the Deputy Chairman of the Tory Party, who used what was described as salty language, which I won't repeat, about people who were coming to the barge and that they should go back to France, basically. Now he is an interesting character. He's also paid £100,000 a year by GB News for his programme on that. He works for eight hours a week, which works out about £240 an hour. So we've got people like him being very involved in the rhetoric. We've also got interesting figures, special advisers for Swella Braverman, so people like the former editor of the Mail on Sunday are now advising Swella Braverman. Really good at capturing that public attention, punching through, you know, you'll see front pages on the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday. They'll be very much in support of the rhetoric that's being pumped out by the Conservative Government. You've got people like Katie Lam, who was described previously when she was Boris Johnson's special adviser as Dominic Cummings Protagay, is now also working for Swella Braverman in the Home Office. So you've got this really interesting coalition of people who are really pushing out this rhetoric. Why this rhetoric matters is that the polling from the public doesn't tell them that the public actually supports these policies. So, in fact, the latest Ipsos poll, which was done fairly recently just a couple of months ago, was showing that the majority of the UK, more than 50 per cent, actually thought that they didn't support stopping people from coming. When you take people who were undecided, that leaves a small majority, not a small majority, but a minority who would support these policies. We were just reflecting before we came on that in a recent question time, in a Conservative audience, most people did not support the Rwanda plan. So how do you get support for these type of plans and take attention away from the backlog? You really use framing and rhetoric and you really use this kind of language around moral panics, folk devils, and that kind of old-school kind of, you know, we've seen it with the war on drugs, you know, prohibition, crackdowns, being tough on crime, and that will divert away from what we probably in this panel would argue is the real crisis, is that people's lives are being treated as collateral damage. And so I think that's why it matters. Thanks for that. I actually wanted to come to you, Andy, just before we move on. Where does it work well? So there's clearly a model here which has been described as perhaps cynically constructed to follow a political agenda perhaps, but what models work well in terms of human dignity and also work efficiently elsewhere, say, in Europe? Is there examples perhaps if anyone in the panel has a view? Yeah, that is a good question. I'm going to answer that in two minutes, but I wanted to reflect on what Karen said there about public discourse and also reflect on the gentleman that has sadly left us in this session. Because the public discourse speaks to that gentleman who I think is potentially scared. And the manifestation of his fear is anger. And he's scared because he's being told that the reason why there's a hotel in his community, for example, is because everybody's coming here. And he doesn't know that the only reason there's a hotel in the community is because the Home Office have stopped making asylum decisions so that people are not being processed through to refugee status or not being processed through to an appeal system and eventually leaving the United Kingdom. So the result of that backlog is that the community accommodation filled up and then the hotels came and the hotels filled up and then the barges come. But he doesn't know that because he's not told about it. He doesn't know that the reason why the boats started coming is because all of the other routes into the United Kingdom were closed. So he doesn't know that in 2020 the only way to enter the United Kingdom to claim asylum legally was closed. He doesn't know that. And that's why the boats came. There's not a coincidence that the routes into the UK were closed in 2020, 2021. And then the boats started. Castermind's back. I don't think you remember news stories about boats before them. But he doesn't know that. He thinks that the United Kingdom takes everybody and that people like me, professional enablers, as we've been advised by the Home Secretary, want more boats. We're chasing a gravy train. This is some sort of conspiracy. He doesn't know that United Kingdom takes less than 1% of the world's refugees that were number 18 on the list of European countries taking refugees. He doesn't know that France takes two or three times as many. Germany takes five or six times as many. He doesn't know that. He doesn't understand or he's not told many of these things. And I think that's the problem. What he's told instead is the United Kingdom could take 100 million people because everybody wants to come here. And it's a lie. But he doesn't know that. And I think that's why the public discourse is so important. And in terms of what other countries do, I mean, I think that's an excellent question. As I said, many other countries take far more asylum seekers and refugees than we do. Germany is a perfect example of that. Many other countries have lots of different safe and legal routes into the UK, into their country for refugees. The United Kingdom does not. The UK Home Office did a commendable thing with the Ukraine scheme and it has a commendable scheme as well on Hong Kong. But that's it. We have an Afghan scheme that last year took 22 people. The other resettiment schemes take something in the range of 200 to 400 a year. If you are fleeing persecution in Uganda because you are gay and you have a brother here, you cannot come here. This is one of the key issues. And that is an alternative to what we have right now. Surely the alternative is to open up safe and legal routes, recognise that for the people that we do have safe and legal routes, they're not on a boat. There's no Ukrainians or Hong Kongers on the boats. No one's saying we take everybody. That gentleman potentially thinks that we are saying that. No. I don't think anyone in this room would agree with that. But it's about doing your fair share and simply saying no, pointing at something and saying no, no more, is demonstrated time and time again to not work. The fact that we keep doing it in this cycle is frankly astonishing that we're still here. We can look around to different European countries. They're not perfect either. I'm not going to sit here and say that. But there are definitely alternative models that can be used and we should look at them more carefully. Any thoughts on examples elsewhere in the world that work well? I was just going to try and turn the question a little bit. I think we should not look at this through only or mainly comparative states. We should look at this within the UK context. There are some really outstanding examples. We're sitting with a panelist that leads a work in Maryhill integration network where the local is often where the good work can be done as opposed to the states because often at the state level, that's where some of the toxic politics can start to frame the debates around migration, including within that recently refugees. We are seeing the rise of overtly fascist leaderships and voices and also governments within the state level. But a point that Cam touched on as well is perhaps elsewhere around in who's name is this approach and then this legislation has been taken and there's a gap between the people who are perpetrating the legislation and in who is interested in this type of legislation and this type of restrictive approach to refugees and migration is in. There are other people who are basically being silenced or having words put into their mouths or having their sentence finished for them who actually don't want this type of approach and maybe they're a Wanda policy and what that actually means is starting to reveal some of those tensions that the legislation and the approach isn't a name but I think we should consider looking at local areas as well about bringing people together. It's not a solution but it's just a comment to try and balance out that we shouldn't only look at comparative states we should also look at what can be done locally in terms of making people feel welcome and making people feel able to deal with often the pretty systemically restrictive impact on restrictions on people's rights in the UK asylum system is one of many that have that. I really appreciate that insight and I think it leads us on neatly to a point that I really wanted to raise with PNAR. One of the experiences that I've had certainly is that an MP and MSP has been young people, constituents of mine, coming along heartbroken because they've went through school and then they've got great qualifications and they really wanted to go on and study at university but then suddenly found because of some obscure restrictions they didn't qualify for student support and therefore this opportunity that was tantalisingly close was snatched away from them and I think that had a big psychological effect on a lot of young people that I represented. PNAR, I was really heartened to see the Grades Not Visas campaign and that was a particular example. I think just that Graham highlights some innovations that have been happening. Perhaps you could tell us a bit more about that campaign. I feel like we've been hearing throughout the panel is how restricted the immigration system is so maybe we can call it the restricted system as it takes away people's right at so many various levels through one's journey. So while someone is seeking asylum and while they are navigating the process they are not allowed to study full-time courses at colleges and they are not allowed to study at the university level as well as they will be treated as an international student and one of the things that we have seen over the many years is that we have young people who are children of people seeking asylum so people who are 15, 16, 17-year-olds and they set their exams and then they get the qualifications to attend either a full-time course at the college or at the university however they are not able to do that as they will be treated as an international student and then we also have people who are seeking asylum who do go to colleges who are only allowed to study part-time courses then once they get their grades they are not also allowed to study at the university level as well and this was an area that we have seen over the many years and it had a huge impact on people's journey to continue their life so that they can take that next step to go to education, to further their education and I think that it was last year or two years ago we had one of a young student called Ahmed who came to Min and we had a discussion about how he had his grades and when he applied to university he was refused unfortunately based on his immigration status and we decided to start a campaign called our grades not visas and one of the best aspects of the campaign was at the same time there was a legal case led by Just Right Scotland, by Andy and by Ola who was in a similar situation as Ahmed who took a legal action as the students' right to education was violated which Andy can talk about more and we've managed to raise awareness about the on-going issues to see how many people are impacting this whether that's young people or people who are in the asylum process wanting to attend higher education and as a result of the campaign as well as hugely by the legal action the Scottish Government had to put through a consultation to gather information about what could be changed as it was found out that they violated Ola's rights to education so as a result of this now children of people seeking asylum can go to university also anacompanyd children can also go to university and we still want to continue to find and discuss about other possibilities of how to extend this to people seeking asylum as well at the moment there are some scholarships which is called sanctuary scholarships each university decides how many they are providing this to and this is for people seeking asylum so for example maybe the Glasgow University has 20 or 30 and Strafclyde has X number of scholarships provided however we still feel that this still puts a barrier for people to attend higher education as it still is a competition process where people have to apply for the scholarship and if you are lucky then you get a place in the university so that was a huge successful campaign and maybe I'm sorry I'm going to pass it to Andy so Andy can talk about it It's an interesting example where there's a reserve policy in relation to immigration asylum but there's also devolved competencies where there are significant interventions that can be made to improve quality of life and perhaps you'd like to tell us more about the legal process of how you achieved this change in the law so this is a good news story it's nice talking about one of those this is a story about how you can pull levers in Scotland that are devolved so within the powers of the Scottish Parliament to try and improve the lives of people even though Westminster controls the situation with their immigration status so it's about doing things here that make life better here even though it's different to their immigration status and it's also a good example I think of a legal organisation and a community organisation working hand in glove to try and bring about some change off the back of what has been a long standing issue for the community so when you think about the term international student you'll probably think a student coming from America or Canada or India or whatever in the world is really coming to study here and do a masters or something but the rules that we had here actually in Scotland were that even if you lived here as a young person even if you came here as a young child and grew up here and had legal status the whole time when you came to apply to go to university you were still treated in most cases as an international student so we represented a young woman called Ola who arrived here just before her 11th birthday went through her entire secondary school here had legal status the whole time and when she applied to go to study medicine at Dundee she wants to be a doctor for goodness sake we need as many of them as we can get she was told no you need to have lived here for seven years and you've lived here for six years ten months you're 58 days short so we said come on can you just forget about the 58 days and the government said no we cannot do this we were working with a separate young person who grew up in care here he wanted to be an engineer for the RAF applied for a course he was 20 years old when he applied so he needed to have lived here for ten years and he'd lived here for nine years ten months and he was similarly told no you cannot get funding to go a young person that was raised literally by the Scottish State extraordinary so we took a case to the court of session here in Edinburgh saying this is not fair this is a violation of their right to education charging them 50,000 a year for somebody who's effectively a scot is ridiculous and it's discriminatory and the Scottish Government after saying defended it until the end but they lost and the upshot of that is that because of the way human rights law works in this country is that when you lose a case like that in Scotland the law just gets ripped up and the court says I'm not going to tell you what to do next but you need to rip up the law and start again and that was an example for me anyway of kicking down the door basically and working with the campaign to say well you know don't listen to lawyers like me I have no experience of the issue I'm not best placed to talk about this community group and Ahmed and Ola and the young people actually affected R so walk on through the door listen to them and you know change and the upshot of that is that the Scottish Government not only did it to its credit not only did it change the rules reducing the timescales you know you just need to have lived here have a visa and lived here in the UK for three years and live in Scotland so much much better now but also they extended it beyond that on the company of the Samseekers and the children of the Samseekers as well so they went beyond actually what they needed to and that's a direct result of the campaigning that was being done in the our grades and our visas campaign so it's a good news story of where that nasty word human rights law can be used for goods community work can be used for good and we are improving the lives of people who live here and the economic downside is that we get more engineers and more doctors and more you know there's only upside in terms of the small amount of money that it costs both upside to our economy, upside to our community, upside to our society so it's a good news story Karen can you tell us a bit more about like sometimes I feel that these debates can often get caught in the horns of binaries particularly in constitutional debates about where power should sit where power is reserved and sometimes you know we don't often focus on what we can do practically to help people now do you feel that we need to do more in Scotland to sort of really hold ourselves to account much more in the public sphere around practical interventions we can do to make things better sure and that's a really concrete example and I think it's maybe just worth saying and probably I should have said this in the kind of opening remarks but we're talking very much here about an event which is about navigating migration it's just important to remember that that is a minority group that's disproportionately affected by the hostile environment so I suppose that the largely unseen way that migration is operating and working in our society it's just important to remember as well and maybe just thinking about learning from that I suppose and thinking about the ways in which we can make things easier for everybody in the migration system so it's about education there's other areas where we can really look at that in terms of things like housing so the fair has done quite a lot of work around asylum housing for really quite a long time I suppose and you see the way that I do a lot of work of writing as well about homelessness and homelessness that's for people who are coming through a non-migration route and it's not great for them either I'm doing a lot of writing about really bad conditions local authorities that are breaking their own very good legislation but what they do have is they do have better rights and so I think that particularly comes down for children and young people so we have really good rights around Scottish children and young people only being in bed and breakfasts for seven days after which point when you can involve a lawyer you can get them moved out of that housing under Scottish housing law now that is not true obviously for the children of asylum seeking families who are spending long periods of time in really unsuitable accommodation in overcrowded hotel rooms with often people who have been through really traumatic events people who don't have all the support systems in place as a Scottish family that's really a very difficult situation not getting access to school often long waits because of things like not having a permanent address so we've covered children that have been out of school for months on end which you can imagine as a parent is an incredibly stressful thing just through bureaucracy really and these are the kind of things that we could again get involved in education, housing and now we create some kind of better citizenship rights for people that are right here in Scotland just now Are there any particular cases that you've come across that struck you as particularly difficult? I mean that one in case I think we did meet around a couple of teenage boys were living in a bed and breakfast in Grunuch and their parents and their younger brother were in Musselborough and the younger brother had a disability but was stuck in a hotel room to get access for example and they went over to visit them properly they couldn't go into the hotel and they were street begging to fund the train tickets to get to Edinburgh to go and see their parents so it just felt like a particularly horrific example to me of how this works in the most egregious manner Absolutely and there's lots of different cases like that I suppose where you see people in just really harsh situations where families are not getting to spend time together where people who are really too young like these boys I think were 16 so you know should not have been apart from parents and disabled brother not able to visit properly that particular family were in housing I think very kind of isolated housing it's very difficult to reach by public transport and the housing was not suitable for the disabled child or young person either I think there's also you know Andy talked about people being scared and therefore angry I think there's a reality that we're facing just now which is I talked before about those essential truths at the heart of Moral Panics and you know we're living through the incredible times of austerity and lack of resource so housing you know is in this really short supply and everyone is trying to get more good social housing and that's what we desperately need and so because we've got this real shortage of resources you see local authorities making decisions that are really pretty horrendous for people at all stages of the process but particularly at that sharp end of people with no recourse to public funds or people coming through insecure migration routes and so you see single mothers being denied accommodation or having to fight for accommodation with their child and that being a really difficult bar to get through at times and that threat hanging over you whether implicit or explicit around you know the potential kind of involvement of the care system in those type of situations so yeah I think some of those cases stick with me particularly Do you feel it resonates with the public to tell the human story you know we can have a macro debate about the economics of migration maybe that doesn't you know there's a cost there's that kind of argument about this cost so this is a parasitic thing versus you know it's adding to the economy but also telling those human stories of the reality is that the you know of a one family's experience a one person's experience can often hit home much more strongly in the public consciousness Absolutely I mean I think you know I live quite near Kermure Street where there was the real kind of groundswell of people coming together both kind of you know people that were involved in campaigning around Salmswick but just also ordinary people who lived in Pollock Shales in Glasgow when there was a home an immigration raids on two men and you know it was incredible to be there and just feel that groundswell of people who knew their neighbours who knew these two men who knew them as living on the second floor of the flat in Kermure Street and that personal connection was what I think really drove that whole kind of event and I think most people in this panel were there but when people can connect with someone else another human being and see what their life is like I think they always do want to help and do want to understand and so that's why having people on barges having people in hotel accommodation that's actually just institutional accommodation it's not really functioning and it's a hotel like your eye a tourist would experience a hotel we divide people and we stop them from seeing those human stories and so I think that is really the kind of thing that we need to put back is those human relationships and people having the opportunity to just express their humanity and see the similarities instead of this constant push to expose some kind of fault line or difference between people about 10 minutes to go in the panel discussion and I really wanted to bring it into this point about we've got no recourse to public funds for people subject to immigration control we have this restriction on the right to work for people under immigration control yet a debate about how much it costs the public so I just wondered whether what work are we doing in Scotland to sort of talk about the economic opportunity that we're missing I've just fallen on particular from what Cairn was saying is if you look at UK policy on refugees and not only refugees can no recourse to public funds is broader than just refugees it's all about separation and actually it's moving to more about a segregation regime and at its kind of like maybe from our perspective or is they just don't want that human contact and they want to really visualise the separateness and the otherness of people and it's just another one of those racist techniques that we've known about for decades and centuries is that you separate in your other and then you start that process of dehumanising and we're seeing it very nakedly I think at the moment starkly within the UK government under the Conservative party at the moment so in terms of human rights defenders in terms of people who are just concerned, they don't want grandiose terms that human rights defenders apply to they're just concerned about what's happening to the pal or the person they see in the shop or the person they see near the school gates that you know just trying to really articulate the need and the naturalness of people just coming together and living and that's why people being in communities is so very important from us, from a human rights perspective is that we want to see people together within communities because we know and the evidence tells us that the social scientific evidence particularly says you know that that does mean that the barriers don't actually come up in the first place or if they do they dissipate so I suppose just to kind of say that point first and that's why the work that organisations like Pinner does in the integration network is so important just the concept of that just the idea of that but people just coming together is such a simple but powerful one and it's exactly what you won't see from the right especially the kind of like the far right they don't want that, they want to kind of like kind of like peddwl in the idea of the other in terms of Scotland I mean I just want to say a few things about Scotland because I think we've got this refugee policy a decent I would say quite shallow political consensus in relation to refugee rights now I'm here from Scottish Refugee Council and we're one of the participants within the refugee integration strategy it's very well regarded the refugee integration strategy it's called New Scots I say shallow because actually on areas of asylum it doesn't mean anything to people as my experience working in asylum for 10 years in Scotland it doesn't cut through to them people appreciate their consent by Scottish Ministers critiquing UK Government policy but they don't in my experience see follow through of practical action to assist people what they do often as we see people and I keep saying Pinner but it's just because Pinner is an outstanding example of somebody that just takes responsibility that the state should be taking in the Scottish context of the Scottish state should be taking the work that Andy and Pinner done are grades not visas as Andy said the Scottish Government fought that tooth in nail to the end I experienced that in a previous life in the Human Trafficking Exploitation Act to be now have when I worked with Jenny Marra MSP and we drafted the private members bill for Scotland and its own Human Trafficking and Exploitation Act and we tried to get the Scottish Government to take that on and they didn't take it on and then we put it through and the Scottish Parliament got the requisite sufficient cross-party support and then there was no choice the Scottish Government either had to let Jenny Marra run by that legislation and it would have passed or the tourer credit the Scottish Government took it on and that's now what we've got the Human Trafficking and Exploitation Act so what I'm trying to say is that we need and I'm deliberately trying to joke here I'm deliberately trying to joke I know this is on Scottish Parliament TV is to say in Scotland in the context of the Illegal Migration Act which abolishes as Andy says the right to asylum for most people who need it as well as even more sickeningly or as sickeningly it abolishes the right of trafficking survivors exploitation survivors to access their support rights including within our Scottish legislation we need a commensurate response from the Scottish Government to the gravity of those rights violations and the new Scots Refugee Integration Strategy cannot do that because that was premised on a pre illegal migration act time we're no longer in that time the right to asylum has been effectively abolished the right to be free of traffic to exploitation is effectively abolished as well unless there's challenges taken to deal with those issues now I know that doesn't deal with the economic points Paul but I was aware of time to get that across that this is a public event this is about people I'm guessing varying levels of interest around refugees and migration issues but we came back before that guy interrupted his early doors in this session it was like one of the points I was trying to say is the gravity of the change that we've now witnessing and I'm not going to be feeling the effects of that but there's people out there who are now feeling the effects of that and you go what is the effects of somebody that's suffering severe forms of exploitation right now who no longer can access those rights to support that as accommodation, legal assistance, counselling you know things that any decent human being would go you're in a situation of exploitation let's get you out of that situation of exploitation and let's start trying to work with you so that you can start to have a bit of control and safety again in your life this is what we're talking about you can answer your question but I just want to convey the gravity of the change that we've got and therefore the need for us all in this room as much as we can within our different ways to really push for substantive work in Scotland against this because otherwise we're going to have severe forms of exploitation ripping through more of our communities because the asylum system, the trafficking system are otherwise being shut down by currently Svela Brafham and the Home Office I mean these rights have been too hard what I know for the years We answered a better question so I'll let you off I wanted to just quickly touch on I don't know if you know I was hit a beamer there with the amount of compliments she was getting there but what I would say is there's practical examples of intervention the Parliament has a role not just to be a sort of echo chamber it's got to hold government to account to its responsibilities we've touched on the Grades Not Visas campaign another example identified by members of the Merrill integration network in Glasgow was transportation as a means of integration the nature in which the segregation is happening quite insidiously but also the economics of rent pressures pushing people to the poorest accommodation in the city often in the outskirts means spatially in places like Glasgow it's hard to get around hard to access services, hard to communicate but the NRPF no recourse to public funds means no access to social security lack of access to work means effective enforced poverty of a bit of extreme degree the stipend which refugees have sorry, asylum seekers have is approximately £4, £5 a day when it works out so a bus fare for the day wipes out your daily allowance so it effectively means total destitution or paralysis socially, physically can you tell us a bit more about the campaign around navigating through the icebergs of the no recourse to public funds restrictions to try and find practical interventions such as extending the concessional travel scheme in Scotland? I think one of the things that Graham also mentioned was the number of people who are seeking asylum and refuge in the UK and in Scotland and when we put that into context at the moment there are about 5,000 people who are seeking asylum in Scotland and out of those 5,000 people obviously there are children who are already getting support from the under 22 bus passes so when we are talking about the number of people who are in Scotland who are struggling and who are I would say at the extreme level of poverty below any other sections in our communities dependent on the home office of asylum support which is £45 a week where you are not allowed to work so if you are a skilled person or if you have a profession your profession is just being wasted over the years and you are not able to contribute to the society, pay your taxes pay your rent and just live as normal a life as a other citizen in the country and now with the hotel accommodation when somebody is in a hotel across the country they are giving £9 a week so this £9 is meant to cover all aspects of your life including travel, buying essential items like a simple thing as a shoe or getting a scarf for the winter which is all year free in Scotland so you are expected to live on this amount that you are given and then if you are lucky that you have a support group or a charity group then you are able to go and connect with people in there and one of the things that has been coming up over the years is the connections people make throughout the city and across the country and how difficult it is to travel when you are giving a limited number of amount of support so we have joined the campaign together with the Voices Network and with Minvoices for the extension to have free bus travel for people seeking asylum in Scotland and we have been having meetings with the transport minister and we are hoped to meet with the new transport minister and we have been speaking with Transport Scotland and one of the things that we found out is that we know that immigration is a reserved matter however transport is a devolved matter and it is an area that could be explored and we feel the long term impact for people to connect and have access to their rights such as if they are placed in Falkirk we have friends in the room from Fos in here let's say if they are in hotel in Falkirk but their lawyers are in Glasgow they have to travel to Glasgow to have an appointment to meet their lawyer that is just simply not going to work for them to travel if there was a meeting let's say twice a week it's just simply not going to happen and I don't think it is fair for other organisations to fulfil the role of the Government and to fulfil the role of local authorities so we hope that with this campaign and now it's been over one year and we have been slightly disappointed with the process of the campaign but we feel that the need is very clear the ask is there and the impact on people's wellbeing and people's connection is very well evidenced and we do hope that we can take this further where it would become a reality at least in this restricted system that people are navigating through they will have some freedom to travel and to be connected and access to certain certain areas within their life whether that's to access injustice in terms of meeting their lawyers or attending education such as going to college or to ESL classes or simply just meeting with a friend just to walk again if you were to go for a coffee you won't be able to go for a coffee because that £9 is so precious that you would want to keep to buy your travel or any other means I appreciate it I think just on that point of no recourse to public funds just to kind of finish up it does have a chilling effect on the civil service, on ministers and their understanding of their freedom of action and they only have given some greater clarity on that but do you still feel it's a big sticking point about the frontier of reserved and devolved competence that we often are reluctant to move as boldly as we could in Scotland in terms of measures such as the under-22s scheme extension to all asylum seekers? Yeah, I think fundamentally when it comes to combating the effect of no recourse to public funds in my experience we see two broad difficulties I would say the first one is at the national level and it is what I perceive to be a concern and to some extent justified given history is that when you take steps to implement something so if the Scottish Government was to introduce a particular fund a discretionary fund to help asylum seekers there's a concern that the Home Office see it and say we've seen this and we're going to put that on the list for no recourse to public funds as well so you can't have that that means people can't get it and that has happened in the past and we see other examples of this happening elsewhere in the UK in Wales they introduced a minimum income for care experience young people so all care experience young people and the Home Office jumped up and down about it because it was going to be given to unaccompanied salms seeking children and actually in the end the amount of money those kids received brought them out of the scope of legal aid so they couldn't get legal aid to see their lawyer for their asylum claim unaccompanied children and so the Welsh Government said to the Ministry of Justice can you just create a wee carve out here for these kids because they need to see the lawyers for their asylum claim and the Ministry of Justice said no so the Welsh Government had to actually take away the minimum income for those kids so that's a good example of where there's just inter-governmental chaos you know politically controversial not shouldn't be a politically controversial statement but you know we are at this moment in time all one country and how are we supposed to legislate how are lawmakers supposed to be doing their jobs when the two governments are like this and you know I'm not necessarily blaming the Scottish Government because that is a consequence of a really nefarious policy making agenda in London but it's problematic the second problem that we see and this is one that's on the ground is a really poor understanding of what no recourse to public funds actually means no recourse to public funds is literally a list and it's written down and it's housing benefits ASA universal credit but if it isn't on the list then it's not a public fund and people can access it but the problem is there's a lot of what we call gatekeeping in statutory authorities and in other institutions where they think public fund just means everything that could possibly come from the public but it's not so we get sometimes local authorities saying oh well we can't provide support to this child and this family because it's a public fund where social work and I say well no it's not it's not on the list can they get legal aid? well yes because it's not on the list and there's a lot of that so it's fine me saying that as a lawyer but the person needs to get in front of me in order to understand that and the gatekeepers I think a lot of them are just mistaken and it's accidental some of them I suspect not so much and I think a lot of them are just mistaken not so much and they're just relying on you not getting in front of a PNR or somebody like me which is difficult and so we spend a lot of our time trying to educate professionals in statutory services around what this actually means because it's actually not that complicated is it on the list? no? well they can access it here end of the lesson on that revelatory point about NRPF it's now 8 minutes past 12 so I want to not eat into our Q&A time any longer and just invite anyone from the room who has a question as I see a gentleman's hand at the back is there anyone else please do wave your hand so there's a few now so hold your thoughts and we'll come back to you all but that's great to have an interest so we'll start with the gentleman at the back and then there's a lady down the front as well and then we'll continue good afternoon everybody my name is John Robertson I have a question for the panel and that is why don't these hordes of immigrant invaders stay in Italy and France why do they all want to come to Britain is it that we're a soft touch so that's an interesting point that's raised quite frequently about why do people migrating or seeking asylum not seek refuge in the first geographical safe territory that they encounter maybe Graham you could answer that point as Paul said it's a really common question and I mean it's an understandable question I'm from Scottish Refugee Council we talk to people who don't agree with what we say I suppose the first thing is just to say that it's just a factual point that most people in the world's refugees particularly rich parts of the world but in Europe don't come to the UK it's a relatively small number so in the stats bear that out we're not going to make a value judgment otherwise it's just that but I suppose this is where I would want to go into maybe more the psychological part here about why people move so if you're somebody who's came from Afghanistan or you've came through Eritrea through Libya you're probably fleeing pretty serious stuff in terms of your your right to life your ability to survive you've maybe witnessed some horrendous atrocities you're going to be going through pretty grinding separation from everything that you've been familiar with so in other words and I suppose that I'm not being this godly it's a big deal right it's a big deal and I think it's important for us as people here in a relatively stable part just to not kind of like hurt ourselves when we're going overboard and empathising but been recognising that we've I can't obviously speak and I wouldn't speak for everybody in this room that would be completely inappropriate but we haven't had to do that generally in Scotland we haven't had to make that perilous survival decision so that's kind of a human level people have to get out of really bad situations I suppose the second bit and this is one of the reasons we think the refugee convention has been such a successful life saving instrument our law over the last 70 to 80 years is again I can only speak for myself but if I had to get out of a situation my home maybe I've lost some of my family are they in danger I don't just want to go somewhere and just sit there which is what most of the world's refugees do is sit in a camp and that's my life because I only get one life that's my life I'm just sitting in a camp and I've got to just park my life if I've got children park my children no of course I'm not what human being is going to do that they're not wanting to and they shouldn't be expected to do that people have lives people have values human beings regardless of whether their refugees or whatever their background is but to me that's what human rights means sir most human relatable thing to do is not only to get out of the danger but then to move somewhere where you feel you can build a life so then you go into ok where am I going to be able to build a life well if I have the language that or I've got a bit of the language in this case English then yeah that's a pretty good reason if I've got a pal that I used to go to school with or from a local area that's another really human relatable reason that I can certainly associate and relate to if I feel that there's going to be an ability for me if I've got a professional background which many refugees do that I can actually further my own go back to this thing about building a new life that second often forgotten part of what being a refugee is then I'm going to do that now for the vast majority of the world's refugees I said in my opening remarks that isn't, they don't come to the UK it's a very small small proportion it's like 0.1% of the world's refugees asylum seekers, sorry, come to the UK and proportionately compared to other countries of equivalent size in Europe it's very relatively small so I think there's very understandable I suppose what I'm trying to say sir is that it's an understandable question but from our perspective from my perspective you know we think it's the most human relatable thing to do if there's language, if there's family if there's friends if there's something that they feel they can build a new life perhaps their professional skills then that's something that I can get behind because I think that person's got a danger and they've moved to somewhere which might not be the first safe country but that other country might not be where they have their language or the friendships or the family or where they feel they can be safe for the rest of their lives there's a couple more questions put your hands back up if you were wanting there's a couple of ladies here let me do groups of three and that means we can try and cram as many in as we can so the lady just there and then we'll come down this side and do three and then we'll come over here don't worry I had two questions hopefully they won't be too complicated one was for Graham you were talking about the local being a positive and I totally agree with you on that but with the new legislation should we be expecting that people will reach that point because what happens to someone when they arrive say in Calais are they going to come to a hotel like I work in Falkirk or are they going to be put into detention from that point you got another question you wanted to quit the question was I don't know if Pinar or anyone else on the panel has any examples because I'm seeing people leaving asylum accommodation and then going into homelessness accommodation I'm wondering if there are any examples of positive pathways to housing because obviously the council housing pathways are failing just now for various reasons and I don't know if there are any organisations helping people into stable housing which will then allow them to apply for jobs and move on with their lives accordingly hold those thoughts and we're just going to the leader here and then you answer questions as well so we'll just do you guys and then we'll come back to the panel sorry my name is Sophie Taylor I'm not going to ask a question on locality I was interested in the business case I was listening to a professor from Finland looking at geographical across Europe including the UK and the decrease in birth rate she says that in 2026 it will become very obvious that we are unable to sustain our economy because of that and that looking at migration as an answer to this process the question was actually based on the issue of only two working individuals supporting every pensioner in the United Kingdom we have Brexit as a problem we have a massive shortage of people who can work and I don't actually quite understand why this government is still hanging on this to this process to stop asylum seekers trying to find work which have the skill the ability and the opportunity to enrich this country and I don't understand there's a business case in this and I don't understand why this government isn't going down that avenue Thanks for expressing your view that was a really good view expressed well so the lady at the front here if you still want to ask a question are you happy ok is there anyone over here take one lady she did want to ask sorry I misunderstood you sorry apologies sorry so my name is Anisha and I am the Quality and Human Rights Officer for Amna in Glasgow that we do support people all over Scotland so the first thing I kind of wanted to talk about was or to gauge an opinion on was what you think about the current system particularly down in England where if a woman is in danger and needs to report something i.e. domestic violence or anything like that there's a barrier to them doing that because automatically irrespective of the reason that the police have been phoned they now have to report that there is an illegal immigration system and there is an immigrant in that house and they have to report it to the home office so it's a barrier to them again accessing their human rights because for whatever reason they need to phone to get some help so I'd like to get an opinion on that and another question just for Andy was does the three-year limit apply for legal cases so in the civil system at the moment you've got to do things within three years if we've got people coming to us that haven't been able to gain any legal representation for three four years can they still use that service and do they still get a chance okay so we had questions I've got the question to Pinar first of all from the lady top would you like to come back on that one yeah so regarding the housing so what happens is when somebody is in the asylum process and then they get granted some form of a refugee status or some form of a leave to remain we have partnered with the Scottish Refugee Council and we have an integration officer in our premises where we then provide that service for the people to take the next step and usually that person has around 28 days to leave their accommodation provided by mayors who is the housing contractor from the home office so they have to leave their accommodation in 28 days and then they have to enroll into a system where they will be giving accommodation within the local area or the local authority so this has been our experience where we work in partnership so that people are guided with the right information and they have the option to choose which local authority that they should be going to and also they are giving the correct information in terms of what happens next because navigating the asylum process status then you have a new journey where you have to very quickly learn the system and be supported as well so we work in partnership with SRC in terms of that but if you have any more questions I'm happy to answer afterwards or maybe have a talk as well Andy, would you be able to come back to the point at the front just about some of the issues there Can I ask you to clarify the question the three-year limit are you talking about the education limit OIC Okay, and this is women who have experienced violence I understand it sure is Okay so I think your question is about it's called the prescriptive period so like in order to litigate something the instant needs to have happened within a certain period of time for some cases it's three months for some cases it's six months for some cases it's one year for some cases it's five in my experience it's a significant barrier of accessing justice and we see it across our work actually I was working with a disabled woman recently who was experiencing some problems with her local authority this is not a migration case and she was told to go through the complaints process in the council and it took a year and when they came out and said and we were at the point she contacted us to litigate the case the time limit to bring the case expired after three months so the complaints process just ran down the clock and it's a really common experience it will happen to all of you in this room if you do have interactions like that with the state so it is an issue it's not insurmountable though different cases have different time limits and so it's really that specific I would say my view is always like where there's a will there's a way so I think if you have anything specific we can talk about it afterwards in the interest of time I just want to try and get some people in from this side of the room so we've got two ladies at the back and a gentleman at the front so there's three here so we'll do this group of three and then we'll figure out who can come back that's great hello my name is Phoebe Warren I work in immigration law and I live in Glasgow you're my MSP I just wanted to get a gauge from anyone who's willing and if I'm able to I'd love to ask Paul as well I know that we look at the government down south and their policies on migration and asylum for better words they've been awfully creative in their policy approaches but as we get closer to the general election I'm becoming more nervous that there's a lack of creativity in policy approaches the opposite way and I was wondering just a gauge of how people are feeling on migration and asylum policies as we get closer to immigration from the labour approach as well particularly and that's someone else hi I'm Rachel and I do some type of climate and film foundation so I was just wondering you were touching on the asylum seekers to earn hotels I'm sure most of you know about what's happening in Erskine right now with the hotel on Sunday more and more far-right groups like patriotic alternative do you think we are seeing a rise in far-right individuals protesting because of the governments or the media if you could just expand on that here hello good afternoon I am Ishmael from Minvoises I just want to ask one or two questions firstly is seeking asylum a right or a privilege secondly what is the pulling factor has to do with all what is going on in the UK what is the push factor the push factor has to do with the people in the UK are they not using asylum issues as a bait for showcasing the inner crisis of governance we have a question around the coming general election UK level in the next year so what are the political dynamics of that in terms of immigration policy that ties into the gentleman's question about is it being used to cover up for an adequacy in government I suppose there is a comms angle there maybe Karen if you had a view on some of that about parties political positions and using immigration as a pinata or a lightning rod absolutely I will let you pick up more on the party political points that were raised at the back but on some of the other factors around asylum as a right versus a privilege whether that is the sense that we don't talk about the push factors we don't talk about the human rights abuses we don't talk about war we don't really talk about what's going on internationally that's causing this and I think that was just to bring it back to my point about it's a little bit like the prohibition on the drug war we don't talk about the reasons why people might be having problematic relationships with substances we just talk about cracking down and being tough on crime and that's basically like trying to address a problem by looking in the wrong direction and it feels like that is absolutely the case here we're seeing cuts to the international aid budget at a time when we desperately need to be much more engaged in the global realities that we're facing and we're just not doing that and a lot of the time if we're looking over here at stopping small boats we're not actually looking at the wider picture of what's going on internationally and what ways of society both in Scotland the UK, as communities, as individuals could be doing about addressing some of that so absolutely 100% we need to be thinking about those push factors and just to go back to the gentleman that points about why people are not stopping in safe countries another thing that's come up to me a lot is people's heartbreak when they grew up in a colony in a country in which they were told that Mother Britain would take care of them in times of crisis and so when they come here they actually were taught that in school and believed it and so to go into a situation in which you are stripped of all the rights that everybody around you has and you are struggling with your health I have people texting me telling me they're suicidal telling me they just can't take it anymore and that's the realities that people across the country are sitting here in Scotland right now facing the devastation of that of taking away that thing that you believed in as Britain, as this great country is another factor I think there so some of the rhetoric is that we've done quite a lot of coverage of Patrick's alternative colleagues of mine at the ferret and we've been charting that over quite a long time and certainly I think that while it's still a minority view in Scotland there's much more visibility and there's much more acceptance of it in the mainstream and I think that is very much to do with some of the xenophobic language that we see coming out of even this week the kind of comments that had no pushback that were accepted and defended by members of the Conservative party so I think it's unleashed a sort of ability for that to be moving into the mainstream and you'll see parties like homelands and so on trying to get on to the ballot papers so it's definitely something that we need to be very alert to so we've got about 20 seconds left so on the point about the political framings and the narrative I think a large part of the problem we have in this country is the first pass to post electoral system I know this is not a seminar on electoral reform but I think a lot of what's going on and what drives behaviours in our political discourse is actually calculating the electoral system and where narratives play well in target constituencies and I think that creates a big distorting effect on our national conversation so without getting into the weeds of it I think that's the underpinning issue I have and that's why I support a change in the electoral system in the UK towards proportionality so I think we'd have a more sane political discourse generally so without getting into that indulgent point any further I just want to say massive thank you to our panellists who I'm sure you'll agree have been very enlightening today so I just would like to invite you to give them a hand to Graham, Pinar, Karen and Andy I want to thank you for your attention and your courteousness and the way in which you engaged and what are often quite challenging and contentious issues and for being so understanding so despite the interruption unscheduled I think we had a productive session and if there's any further points you want to raise I'm sure we'll happily chat to you afterwards so thank you again for your time thank you and hope you enjoy the rest of the session