Oral Answers to Questions

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Monday 17th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood]

We are working with Ministers across Government on closing every hotel as soon as possible, and by the end of this Parliament. As we have all seen, that is a complex process that must be delivered through a controlled, managed and orderly programme of work. We do not want to be in a situation where, without an alternative ready, we start exiting hotels before it is time to do so. I assure my hon. Friend that we will take a balanced and evidence-based approach towards making decisions about the locations that we will use and how we will exit hotels. I look forward to talking to him in more detail about these plans in due course.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

The Government are currently spending some £2.1 billion on hotels, but the system is not working. It does not have to be that way. The Public and Commercial Services union and Together With Refugees have shown that a humane asylum system, which expedites asylum hearings and supports employment, could reduce asylum costs by 40%. Will the Home Secretary at least look at the evidence and concede that she does not always have to try to outdo the hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage)?

[Shabana Mahmood]

What I am interested in is recognising the extent of the problems that this Government have inherited and coming up with proper solutions to those problems. For me, this is not about party politics or individual politicians, but a moral mission to fix a broken system that is unfair, costing the country far too much money and putting huge pressure on communities. I ask the hon. Gentleman to engage with the detail of the proposal, rather than playing party politics himself.

Asylum Policy

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Monday 17th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood]

I understand the point that my hon. Friend is making. The reality is that there are a lot of failed asylum seekers within the asylum accommodation system, and I am sure she would accept and agree that where somebody has a failed claim and no right to be in this country, the best thing to do is to voluntarily leave the country. We already provide packages to help people make that decision. I do not want to see people homeless in this country, but I know she cannot possibly think that the answer to that is essentially for there to be no consequence of a failed asylum claim. We need to run a system where the rules are enforced, as uncomfortable as that might occasionally be. We recognise that we do not want people in destitution; that is why we make financial packages available for people to voluntarily leave the country, and that will always be the case.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

In its manifesto, Labour promised to defend migrants’ rights and build an immigration system based on compassion and dignity. Instead, we have a policy that is welcomed by Reform UK and has even found favour with Tommy Robinson. Throwing refugees into destitution, denying any meaningful route to citizenship and forcible evictions—where exactly is the compassion and dignity in that?

[Shabana Mahmood]

Given that Tommy Robinson does not even think I am English, he will certainly not be supporting anything I have to say, but let us just leave that there. We do not need to hear any more about what vile racists have to say about anything.

Let me say to the hon. Member that it is not a surprise to find a Scottish National party Member of Parliament defending a broken status quo; that is what they do with the Scottish Government under the SNP every day, and it is what he is doing now. I hope he can agree that good, much-needed reform of a broken system is the best way to retain public support for having an asylum system at all.

Manchester Terrorism Attack

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Monday 13th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood]

The volunteers of the Community Security Trust are absolute heroes and do vital work every single day. They were there at the site of the attack, and the actions of those volunteers and worshippers at the synagogue in Manchester on 2 October saved many, many lives. So many people were cowering behind the door to the synagogue, keeping it shut and preventing the attacker from entering. I cannot imagine what must they have gone through while they did so, but they did so to keep others safe. They are all heroes. I have been very struck by the conversations that I have had with those volunteers.

I assure my hon. Friend that I and the Prime Minister have had constant contact with the Community Security Trust and other Jewish community organisations. We will say more in the coming days and weeks about how we intend to move forward on matters of security, and about the wider picture of giving reassurance to this country’s Jewish community, so that they can go about their business safely.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

First, on behalf of the Scottish National party, I join the Home Secretary in expressing our solidarity with the Jewish community after the horror of the appalling events at the Heaton Park synagogue. Such antisemitic hate must never be allowed to prevail or divide us. In Scotland, the police have increased security in our centres of faith, and have asked the public to remain vigilant following the attack. However, does the Home Secretary not see that by cracking down on our legitimate right to protest, she is simply giving succour to the haters, allowing them to dictate our approach to protest, and to alter basic freedoms that we have always enjoyed? Surely that cannot be the Government’s intention.

[Shabana Mahmood]

The Government’s intention is to ensure that the right balance is struck between our fundamental right to protest and ensuring that our communities can go about their business without living in fear of weekly protests on their doorstep. Through amendments to sections 12 and 14 of the Public Order Act, we are suggesting making it explicit that the police can take cumulative impact into account when imposing conditions. That is not a removal of the right to protest; it is just saying that there are conditions. The protest can carry on, but not in a way that prevents other communities from being able to go about their business in safety and security. I am surprised—well, I am not surprised, because the hon. Gentleman is from the Scottish National party, but I hope that Members across the House understand that getting the balance right is delicate and difficult, and that this measure will put us back toward something that looks and feels much more like a balanced situation. Protests can go ahead, but with some conditions. I would be surprised if that did not get backing from across the House. I hope that it does.

Palestine Action: Proscription and Protests

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Monday 8th September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dan Jarvis]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his comments, and I completely agree. I think there is an absolute point of consensus in this place—and, I hope, much further afield—about the urgent need to secure peace in the middle east. This Government, led by the Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary and colleagues in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, will do everything we possibly can to support that important process.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

The optics of octogenarian priests being arrested alongside hundreds of peaceful protesters are absolutely awful for this Government. We had only three arrests over the weekend in Scotland, because Police Scotland seemed to deploy a much more conciliatory and community-based approach. Does the Minister support operational independence across the UK? If police forces feel it is in their interests to have different policing arrangements from the Metropolitan police, will he support them and say that there will be no Government interference in their operations?

[Dan Jarvis]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his engagement over the course of the summer. I can give him an absolute assurance: yes, of course we believe in the absolute importance of the operational independence of the police. They have to make some very difficult judgments, but I hope he agrees that nobody should be above the law; there is not an age limitation with regard to these offences. The police have difficult judgments to make, but in the main they have acted proportionately and without fear or favour, in the best traditions of British policing.

Borders and Asylum

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Monday 1st September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend raises an important point about the gig economy and the need to ensure that it does not become rife with abuse and misuse when it comes to illegal working. That is why we are bringing in—again, in the Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill, which unfortunately the Conservatives and Reform have continued to vote against—requirements for employers in the gig economy to abide by checks on illegal working. We have also recently signed with some of the major delivery companies a new agreement to share information, so that we can target abuse and crime.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

What a country the UK is becoming! Rarely has the national mood been so ugly and intimidating. People are congregating at hotels, screaming at asylum seekers to go home, and those on the right wing are so emboldened that they feel the streets belong to them. Does the Home Secretary not realise that every time she moves on to Reform’s ground, all she is doing is further encouraging and emboldening them? How about trying something different? How about just occasionally saying something positive about immigration? How about not dehumanising asylum seekers, and instead showing them some compassion, decency and humanity?

[Yvette Cooper]

I just point out to the hon. Member that I have spoken about Ukrainian mums and their experiences fleeing from Putin; the students in Gaza who currently cannot take up their places—we are working on expedited visas for them, so that they can pursue a better future—and the importance of having a proper, legal and controlled route as part of an effective system. That has been part of our history, but we also have to have a system that is properly controlled and managed. We have to have a system that is not open to abuse, misuse and exploitation by criminal gangs. We also need stronger border security, so that it is Government, and not gangs, who choose who comes to our country.

UK-France Migration: Co-operation

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Monday 14th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

My hon. Friend’s question is an important one. Once the final arrangements are ready to operationalise, we will set out in the immigration rules the precise detail of the way in which people will be able to apply from France. They will need to have proper identification and to go through security checks. Once people have applied, we will set prioritisation decisions, including on whether people have connections to the UK, and on the countries from which people are most likely to be refugees or to be targeted by smuggler and trafficking gangs. We will set out that detail in due course. Part of the reason for the one-for-one arrangement is that it has to go alongside returns to France for people who get on illegal boat crossings and end up paying huge amounts of money to fuel the criminal smuggler industry, which will make sure that we simultaneously strengthen our border security and save lives.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

This is a grubby, grotesque little deal, which in itself trades in lives with the selection of who qualifies for this one in, one out basis. This gimmick means we will now have different classes of the wretched, and it does nothing to address the crisis that compels so many people to make these dangerous journeys in the first place. It is a gimmick doomed to fail and it simply will not work. But there is one thing that could smash the gangs in one simple blow: establish the safe and legal routes, which have worked so perfectly in the past, for people to come to this country.

[Yvette Cooper]

The small boat crossings are dangerous and put lives at risk. We have seen people drown and people crushed to death on overcrowded boats. That is being driven and organised by criminal gangs who will do anything they can to profit from these dangerous journeys. The whole point of having the one-for-one approach with France is that we have an agreement that means we will return people who come on those dangerous boat crossings, who pay money to the criminal gangs, and who, frankly, should be returned or should be part of the returns arrangements. In return, we will take those who apply lawfully through the application process and who have had security checks. I think that principle is the right one. The UK, as we have shown through the Ukraine and Hong Kong schemes, will always do its bit to help those fleeing persecution and conflict. However, we also think there should be much stronger enforcement, and we should not have the illegal migration that undermines border security and puts lives at risk in the channel.

Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

As we have heard, the issues around the proscription of Palestine Action has thrown up a number of legitimate concerns. There is no doubt that it will have an impact on our right to protest and on the civil liberties that we have enjoyed for decades. Although it is absolutely right to condemn and prosecute criminal activity, especially those that threaten our national security, surely this must be done within the framework of existing legislation, as it always has been.

This order looks nothing other than a direct response to Palestine Action being able to infiltrate an RAF base and cause damage to a defence aircraft. The decision to proscribe an organisation is ultimately a matter for the Government, and it is up to the Home Secretary to decide who goes on that list. It is based on intelligence that the Government hold. I do not think that the Minister has convinced many of us today that this has met the threshold for proscription, and we need to hear more about their concerns about this particular group.

Before reaching for that power, the Government must take into account whether it is proportionate, justified and in the national interest to proscribe such an organisation. Terrorism legislation, as we know, hands extremely broad powers to the state and, as such, it must always be treated with the highest degree of caution and restraint.

We live in a society where groups and organisations have the democratic right to campaign and express their views on particular issues in a democratic, respectful and lawful manner. It is important that the right to lawful protest is not affected by the Home Secretary’s decision today, and it is extremely concerning that this decision could lead to these powers being extended to other campaigning organisations.

Palestine Action has inexplicably been linked to groups such as the Maniacs Murder Cult and the Russian Imperial Movement—groups unknown to the House until this measure was on the Order Paper today, but they are groups that, from a cursory glance at their activities, should of course be proscribed.

For Palestine Action to be included alongside those groups is, at best, a cynical and calculated move by the Government to ensure that this order gets through today. People all over the UK, including many of my constituents, rightly feel very strongly about the appalling crimes that are being committed against innocent civilians in Gaza on a daily basis. Many of those people have been taking part in weekly protests to make their voices heard, and to show solidarity with the Palestinian people. These people are now concerned that they might be caught up in this proscription.

I am also concerned that many young people who are sharing social media posts from Palestine Action could now be considered to have glorified what will soon be a proscribed group. We need clarity on what actions would result in people being charged under this terrorism legislation. For example, could a person wearing a Palestine Action badge handed out at a demonstration or a rally be charged with terrorism? Organisations such as Amnesty International and even the United Nations have expressed their concern about the UK’s broad definition of terrorism in this regard.

This week, an Israeli strike on a Gaza seafront café killed at least 20 Palestinians. This is what we should be discussing today and every day until a permanent ceasefire is reached and all the hostages are released. The Government must act in the national interest and keep us safe from all the challenges presented to them, but we need clear reassurance about the wider impact of what is proposed.

Deprivation of Citizenship Orders (Effect during Appeal) Bill

Pete Wishart Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 30th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dan Jarvis]

I hope my hon. Friend heard the point I made a moment ago about how the Government have brought forward this legislation in response to a recent Supreme Court decision. Essentially, an appeal against deprivation has resulted in a requirement for us to bring forward this clarification of the law. In response to her and my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Southall (Deirdre Costigan), this does not represent any widening of the existing arrangements. The right of appeal is completely unaffected by this legislation, which is incredibly narrowly drawn.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

I am sure the Minister understands that due process is important and appreciates that the appeals process must be respected fully. He is intending making people temporarily stateless, so can he guarantee that the appeals process will be speeded up and people will have an opportunity to have their case heard in a timeous manner, so they can have their case resolved, not hanging over them for a long time?

[Dan Jarvis]

The hon. Member is absolutely right about the point of due process. I can say to him and to my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing Southall that these powers are used very sparingly. Each and every individual case is decided on by the Home Secretary. I know that this Home Secretary has—and I am sure previous Home Secretaries have—taken these responsibilities incredibly seriously. Decisions are made carefully, on advice and in accordance with international law, and I am happy to give the hon. Member and others that assurance.

Oral Answers to Questions

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Monday 2nd June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dame Angela Eagle]

We are tackling illegal working by significantly increasing enforcement. That is why we have had a 40% increase in visits and a 42% increase in the number of arrests for illegal working. There are fines of £60,000 per illegal worker discovered, and those who are discovered working illegally can be arrested and put on the route to deportation.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

Surely the best way to tackle illegal working is to make more legal opportunities. The “island of strangers” immigration policy will cause huge issues for the workforce in Scotland; the care service says that it could threaten the whole sector. Asylum seekers waiting for their case to be processed are in effect an unused resource. Why not shorten the time that asylum seekers have to wait before being allowed to work, to bring some relief to such sectors?

[Dame Angela Eagle]

We are shortening the time that it takes to process asylum claims by getting the system that we inherited from the Conservatives working again. That is why there has been a 63% increase in the number of initial claims processed. That follows a 70% fall in the period before the last election.

Immigration

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Wednesday 21st May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dame Angela Eagle]

It is important that all of us acknowledge the humanity of people who come to our country to work, and the contribution that they make. But we also have to have rules: we have to decide who comes to our country and why, and we have to explain those rules to the electorate. That is what I shall go on to try and do.

We inherited a system in total chaos. The Conservatives allowed criminal gangs to take hold across the channel, which saw the numbers arriving rocket from 300 in 2018 to more 30,000 in a few years. They crashed the asylum system, with a 70% drop in monthly decision making and an 80% drop in asylum interviews in the run-up to the election. There was a 34% drop in returns compared with the last Labour Government, and they spent £700 million sending four volunteers to Rwanda. Their handling of legal immigration was no better. Net migration quadrupled in the space of just four years to nearly a million—that is their record.

Those numbers tell a wretched story of a system spiralling out of control; an entire criminal industry building up along our borders with terrible consequences; ruthless smugglers sending desperate people on dangerous, sometimes deadly, journeys and making a fortune in the process; basic rules not being enforced; and a collapse of trust and confidence in the state’s ability to perform one of its most fundamental functions: keeping our borders safe and secure.

So bad was the Conservatives’ record that the public simply stopped believing anything they said—and who can blame them? For all the talk about stopping the boats and stopping this crisis, the crisis carried on. Unsurprisingly, strong words and grotesquely expensive gimmicks make little impact against sophisticated smuggling networks. The task of ending this chaos falls to this Government.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

The Minister knows that I have long believed that this Government are harbouring their own ambitions for a Rwanda scheme. It started with the idea of a returns hub in Albania, but that seems to have been rejected by the Albanian Government. Does the Minister have any further plans to introduce some sort of son of Rwanda on behalf of her Government?

[Dame Angela Eagle]

When we came into office, we ended the Rwanda scheme. The scheme was about deporting people, processing their asylum in another country and never letting them back here. [Interruption.] But it did not work—[Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

I have to say that I was amazed to see a Conservative motion on immigration on today’s Order Paper. I think all that most of us in the House require from the Conservatives is a full and sincere apology for the mess and chaos that they left behind, and then for them to go away for a long period of self-ordained silence. They thought that they were reducing immigration, but what they did was quadruple it. They did not even understand their own immigration policy. They were letting hundreds of thousands of people come into this country. So please, do not get to your feet and have the temerity to lecture this House about immigration after the mess that you made.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Order. The hon. Gentleman did rather incite me to get to my feet, and I am somewhat stunned at his allegation that I have played any part in this.

[Pete Wishart]

That was not like me, Madam Deputy Speaker. It was very lax, and I apologise.

The Conservatives are currently languishing in fourth place in the opinion polls, and it is a well-deserved position.

[Cameron Thomas]

I am making this intervention from the Reform Bench, in the absence, apparently, of their own interest in immigration.

Another thing that I think the Conservative party might answer for is the fact that Vladimir Putin weaponised immigration in 2015 through his terrorist tactics in Syria. I wonder whether the Conservatives have given much thought to how the Conservative Friends of Russia group continued to operate for nearly a decade thereafter.

[Pete Wishart]

I do not think the Conservatives give much thought to anything in this particular field, so I would not even venture to give an opinion on that.

As I was saying, the Conservatives are in fourth place in the polls, and their entire vote has practically gone wholesale to Reform. This scrappy, desperate motion represents a vain attempt to stop that leakage and get some of their vote back. Let me also say to the hon. Gentleman that it does not matter how hard they try—and they are trying—because they will never outperform Reform, who are the masters of nasty rhetoric. The Conservatives are mere amateurs compared with the hon. Gentlemen of Reform who just so happen not to be in their places again.

The whole debate about immigration is descending into an ugly place which seems to fire the obnoxious and the unpleasant. I am talking not only about those two parties but about the Government too, and I am now going to direct my blame at some of the things they are doing. A new consensus is emerging in the House. For all the faux arguments and fabricated disagreements, the three parties are now more or less united in a new anti-immigrant landscape in the House. The only thing that seems to separate them is the question of who can be the hardest and the toughest in this grotesque race to the bottom on asylum, refugees and immigration.

The fear of Reform percolates through every sinew in this House. It dominates every single debate, and everything that is going on. Reform is killing the Conservatives, but Labour seems to want a bit of the self-destruction action too. Everything the Government do on immigration is now looked at through the prism of Reform, and they have even started to get the Prime Minister to use Reform’s language. The hon. Member for Clacton (Nigel Farage) could not have been more generous in his tribute to the Prime Minister for his contribution to nasty rhetoric. The thing is, the “island of strangers” speech could have been made by any one of these three parties.

[Sir John Hayes]

I reassure the hon. Gentleman that I have not changed my mind about this; I have believed it forever. I only change my mind about anything about once a decade. The truth of the matter is that he must know that, according to the ONS, the scale of population growth will be equivalent to the population of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, Newcastle, Peterborough, Belfast, Cardiff, Manchester, Ipswich, Norwich, Luton and Bradford added together. That cannot be reconciled with the quality of life and standard of living that his constituents and mine expect.

[Pete Wishart]

I know the right hon. Gentleman does not change his mind, and it is something that we all love him for in this place. Maybe we should look forward to what is on its way in a couple of decades. I think he knows that a spectacular population decline will start to kick in around the mid-part of this century. Spain and Italy are already doing something about it. All we are doing in this place is stifling population growth through the two-child benefit cap—something that works contrary to what we require.

All Labour is doing is climbing on the anti-immigrant bandwagon, and that is alienating its supporters. I am sure that everybody saw the Sky News report this morning on the intention of former Labour voters. Sky News found that only 6% of lost Labour voters have gone to Reform. Labour has mainly lost votes to the Liberal Democrats and the parties of the left. In fact, Labour has lost three times as many voters to the Liberal Democrats and the left as it has to Reform, and 70% of Labour voters are considering abandoning the Labour party to support the parties of the left.

[Cameron Thomas]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Pete Wishart]

I cannot give way any more.

In chasing Reform voters by using its language and appeasing Reform, Labour is only further alienating its supporters. One can only wonder at the political genius that is Morgan McSweeney, who has managed to chase voters away in a search for voters who do not exist.

[John Slinger (Rugby) (Lab)]

rose—

[Luke Akehurst (North Durham) (Lab)]

rose—

[Pete Wishart]

I cannot give way—I have no time.

Ordinary Labour voters have good, liberal values, but just now they have a party that is not representing their views. That is why they are moving on.

In Scotland, we take on Reform. We are one of the few parties across the United Kingdom that has steadied its own position, and we have even improved it slightly. There is a big gap between us and Reform. That is because we take on Reform’s arguments and we do not appease the party or go on to its agenda. I encourage Labour colleagues to think about that.

We now have an immigration policy that is the exact opposite of what we need in Scotland, and it is contrary to our national interest. Scotland is in the early stages of the population and demography crisis, and it will only get worse because of what this Government are going to impose on us. We will soon have too few working-age people available to look after an ever-increasing older population.

For all three parties—Labour, the Conservatives and Reform—immigration is a burden and is out of control. For us in Scotland, it is essential to the health of our workforce and our economy. That is why we will never stop calling for a separate Scottish visa. We need the tools in our country to face up to our crisis. I will leave the Government to get on with their grotesque race to the bottom and to pander to Reform in a vain attempt to get some votes, but Scotland does not need their new “island of strangers” policy. It is contrary to what we want, so please leave us right out of it.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

We will now have an immediate four-minute time limit.