John Swinney defends immigration as Scotland faces rise of Reform | Scottish politics

Saying Scotland needs immigration to increase its working-age population, the country’s chief minister has made a strong case for diversity in the face of growing support for Reformation ahead of next May’s Holyrood elections.

John Swinney was speaking at the end of a year that saw a significant shift in Scottish public sentiment, with Nigel Farage’s party taking 26% of the vote in its first Holyrood by-election test.

Farage’s popularity is now higher than that of Keir Starmer, and Scotland has been forced to confront its prevailing image as a tolerant country, heavily supported by the Scottish National Party government, in the face of protests outside asylum hotels and flag-raising across the country.

“Of course I’m concerned about this because I believe in the importance of being involved in our society with every part of my body,” Swinney said. “Over my lifetime Scotland has become a much more diverse country. I’m very proud of that and I want to make sure that remains our core perspective.”

As 750 of Reform England’s Scottish supporters gathered for an event with Farage this weekend, Swinney said he accepted some would “certainly be affected by the underlying biased message”.

But he argued that far-right views of the sort expressed at some asylum protests in East Kilbride, Falkirk, Perth, Aberdeen and most recently in Inverness, where the UK government had converted a barracks to house asylum seekers, represented a “very, very small minority in Scotland” and suggested there was “quite a lot of traveling support” for Reformation.

“What the far right is doing is blaming these concerns on asylum seekers or immigrants, and I think that is the root of the poison that Farage and his cronies are spreading in Scotland,” he said.

However, Swinney also made a clear distinction between those with far-right views and those with “legitimate views” about pressure on local services or community safety, stating that these were not specific to areas hosting immigrants.

Recent polls show immigration has become a voter priority in Scotland for the first time, and focus groups have cited views, previously more evident in England and Wales, that politicians are not taking such concerns seriously enough.

Swinney said he’s willing to listen but also wants to engage in rational discussions about the economic benefits of immigration, especially in an environment where many people are “angry and frustrated” about their living standards.

He said he often speaks with businesses struggling to hire staff. “We have a problem with the size of our working-age population, and I think that needs to be solved through immigration,” he said. “It is in all of our interests to have a welcoming economy that attracts people to the country, creates wealth, and makes us all richer as a result.”

Of course, he said, he’s talking to voters who have “strong views.” “My approach is not to ignore people’s legitimate concerns, but I will engage with them and offer them an alternative perspective,” he said. “My job as Prime Minister is to tackle these attitudes, to do what I can to persuade them not to vote for Reform.

“Let’s not pretend that the only pressure on public services is due to immigration. Since 2010, we have been swimming against the tide of austerity, where public services have been continually undermined by cuts to UK government funding.”

So should people worried about public services blame the UK government rather than asylum seekers? Isn’t it the Scottish government? “We have made decisions to break patterns of austerity, such as asking high-income earners to pay more taxes so we can start investing in public services.” he said.

Various Scots, including former prime minister Humza Yousaf, have previously warned against “Scottish exceptionalism”, especially if the country avoids the far-right riots that swept the UK in the summer of 2024.

Swinney dismissed complacency, pointing to numerous government programs that promote community integration. “I don’t think at any stage we are exempt from those feelings,” he said.

He argued that the Brexit referendum, in which a majority of Scots voted to remain in the EU, proved that “at the beginning of all this, very different attitudes prevail in Scotland and the rest of the UK”.

He also denied that his strategy of attacking Reform risked inadvertently boosting its votes, as some of his own MSPs suggested happened in the Hamilton by-election, where the SNP lost the seat to Labor and Reform took a strong third place from the start. “The visibility of their support is clear, and if I don’t acknowledge it, you can easily tell me I’m missing something very important right in front of my eyes,” he said.

Ahead of the SNP’s first Holyrood election campaign event, Swinney said he regretfully believed Reform would win seats in the Scottish parliament in May. Polls suggest the party will win a clutch of seats in the high teens thanks to Holyrood’s proportional system.

The same poll shows the SNP regaining its lead after a disastrous general election result, with Labor falling to second place due to the unpopularity of the UK government.

Swinney did not address whether the SNP would work with Scottish Labor to keep Reform out of any decisive role, but offered an unsurprising “absolute guarantee” that it would not work with Reform and was aiming to win an outright majority.

He said there could be a Plaid first minister in Wales, a Sinn Féin first minister in Northern Ireland and an SNP first minister in Scotland after May. “The UK government will have entirely tougher terms on its hands,” he said.