Alison Rowat: Scotland needs to make the case for more immigration, not less

But somewhere along the line the aliens gave up. Though possessed of intelligence far beyond our ken, not one of them could make head or tail of British immigration policy, and as one the little green men and women cried, “Chuff this for a game of soldiers. Let’s register mineral rights on Mars instead”.

READ MORE: Most Scots want to curb EU immigration after Brexit

Perhaps there are one or two still out there monitoring developments, in which case they will be stunned at the latest turn of events. Last week, the Windrush scandal went mainstream, with the shoddy treatment of those who came to Britain from the Caribbean between 1948-73, and their families, exposed.

Despite being encouraged to come to Britain, and enduring decades of low pay, bad housing and the worst jobs, these sons and daughters of Empire found Mother Blighty had not recognised them as citizens and had destroyed the paperwork that would prove their right to remain.

So when they wanted to apply for a new job, or re-enter the country after a visit abroad, or anything else most of us take for granted, these British citizens in all but paperwork found the door slammed shut in their faces. The reason? The Home Office under Theresa May as Home Secretary and David Cameron as Prime Minister, had decided that on immigration a “hostile environment” would be created, complete with vans touring the streets telling people to “go home or face arrest” if they were in the UK illegally. In making this putrid omelette a few eggs and a lot of lives were broken, for which the current Home Secretary, Amber Rudd, is having to say sorry over and over again till she makes things right. She never fully can. It was a disgraceful way to treat people. Heads should have rolled, or at the very least be hung in shame for an appropriate period.

READ MORE: Home Secretary regrets failing to see scope of Windrush scandal sooner

But it is the modern Conservative Party we are talking about here. Shame is for benefit claimants, shamelessness is for those who shape and set policy. Step forward, then, one Boris Johnson, who operates his own one man job share as Foreign Secretary/leadership contender. Just in time for the local elections in England, Mr Johnson is calling for an amnesty for illegal immigrants who have been in the UK for 10 years. As long as they do not have criminal records, they are in.

Boris has walked this way before, as London Mayor and as part of the Leave campaign, arguing that more legal, tax-paying migrants mean more money in the bank for the Government. He is reported to have support in Cabinet, including from Michael Gove, but not from the PM who frets about wrong messages being sent. Now she frets?

Meet the new, post-Brexit, forward-looking, global-thinking Conservatives: same as the old ones, but with a few of them now trying to put a positive spin on their immigration position in the hope it makes them seem less like Little Englanders. No wonder residents of outer space are confused. They have not seen such offences against logic since they rumbled us on mashed potatoes.

With the Conservatives on the back foot over immigration, one might think now was the time for those who take a different, more positive view to come to the fore. They did. The Scottish Government and official agencies launched the “Scotland is now” campaign to showcase what the country has to offer to those who would like to visit, do business, or move here. In terms of tone, this cheery jumble of images of weans, landscapes, Andy Murray et al was like the New Seekers’ Coke ad compared to the Conservative Government’s default soundtrack on immigration, Mars: Bringer of War.

It is a welcome effort, but it is also an unnecessarily timid one, not just from the SNP-led Scottish Government. Where are the passionate speeches from Scottish politicians across all parties in defence of immigration? Why are they not seizing on this rare moment to change the debate? Never mind Boris and his insistence on illegal migrants being “squeaky clean”, when is Scotland going to squeak up more on immigration?

READ MORE: SNP hopes for last-minute deal with May on Brexit Bill

When it comes to the numbers, Scotland might be said to be playing a smart game already. The latest statistics from the National Registrar for Scotland, published last week, showed the population reaching a high of 5,424,800, up 20,000 in a year. Migration remained the biggest factor, but the numbers are down from 31,700 to 23,900. More worrying still, there were 3800 more deaths than births.

Put this in the context of an ageing population that is growing by the day and Scotland is, at best, only nibbling at the edges of the problem. Like Germany, like many western countries, Scotland needs migrants and refugees if we are to keep raising the money that pays for the standard of living we want. But Germany, having opened its doors to hundreds of thousands of refugees, is now held to be the example that discourages les autres. Open the door too wide, as Chancellor Angela Merkel learned, and you invite a backlash.

Too often, though, we take the short term view of migration when its effects often take generations to play out. Who is to say that 50 years from now the continuation of the German economic miracle won’t be ascribed to the refugee policy of 2015?

All Scottish political parties need to show more of the vision thing about immigration. It is one thing to argue for Scotland to have powers over immigration, but it is not at all clear what we would do with them. Would Scotland be a more welcoming place to migrants and refugees, or is that something, like a willingness to pay more for public services, that we like to cherish in the abstract more than we want to test in reality? Would we shy away from opening the doors for fear people would simply use Scotland as a gateway to England?

The population is a lot more grown up about immigration than politicians believe, if only for purely selfish reasons. We’ve got the shiny new video, we’ve got the numbers, now let’s get some backbone.