Jim Murphy: A clear solution to demographic woes

Published on Saturday 25 July 2009 19:28

DID you know that within two decades the average age of the Scottish population will be 45?

That's a jump of five years on our current average and almost four years older than I am now. It is great news that most of us are living longer but an ageing population puts pressure on our welfare state and a raises a big question mark about our economic competitiveness.

This week saw the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act become law. This builds on the success of the introduction of an Australian-style points-based system for temporary migration by introducing a system of "earned citizenship". Over the summer we will be consulting on this new points-based route to citizenship and I am pleased to say living and working in Scotland is proposed as one way to earn points. Our need for a growing population is ranked alongside the need to recruit to occupations where we have a shortage.

As we turn to address the demographic challenge, we also this weekend celebrate our diaspora with the Gathering, with Holyrood Park hosting the largest Highland Games ever seen in Scotland. This spectacular event is an opportunity to celebrate the achievements of Scots abroad. And it provides a moment for them to savour the return to their homeland.

Scots have always offered a warm welcome to visitors and tourism plays a vital role in the Scottish economy. Even during this unprecedented global recession, optimism never entirely vanished in the Scottish tourist industry. But for all Scotland's beauty and the success of our tourism sector, tourism illustrates a trend in the Scottish labour market.

I am pleased that so many new Europeans flocked to Scotland to work in tourism but this also indicates that many Scots are unwilling or unable to work in this crucial sector of our economy. This is one example of the demographic challenge Scotland faces now. It is a challenge that cannot be postponed.

For centuries Scots have moved overseas. The sheer scale of Scots abroad is astounding. There are perhaps five people of Scots ancestry abroad for every one at home. The Scottish diaspora numbers around 30 million people. Why did so many Scots go abroad? The stark reality is that poverty, unemployment and a lack of opportunity forced them to go. More than two million Scots left between the 1820s and 1914.

Whenever there is depression there is emigration. That was the story of interwar Scotland. Already by 1914 some 60,000 Scots were leaving annually and this increased during the 1920s and early 1930s. Mass emigration didn't cease in 1945. More than 250,000 Scots went to Canada over the following five decades.

But the past decade has been much better for Scotland. Until 2008 the Scottish economy, the most diverse and resilient ever, delivered year on year growth. Employment reached record levels and the population started to increase. We are experiencing a period of in-migration.

The new Scotland should be a melting pot, embracing long-established immigrant communities from Ireland and Italy, as well as more recent arrivals from the Indian subcontinent and young eastern Europeans. They've changed us for the better and widened our horizons. It is great that these new Scots are contributing here just as Scots contributed abroad. Yet there is also a darker side. In the recent European elections the BNP got a higher share of the vote than the proportion of ethnic minorities in Scotland. Sometimes Scotland appears complacent about the BNP. There is no reason to be.

Western societies are facing the impact of ageing populations that stretch services. At the same time, when the global upturn comes around skilled and innovative young people will be precious assets – the entrepreneurs of tomorrow and the drivers of economic growth.

The expansion of the European Union, which was wholeheartedly backed by the British Government, immediately gave us a broader workforce to draw from. But the former First Minister Jack McConnell knew that even more needed to be done for Scotland to draw on an even wider pool of talent. That's why he initiated the Fresh Talent scheme, the British Government's visionary visa deal, to encourage overseas students to stay, work and prosper in Scotland after graduation.

While I am glad to see talented people from overseas coming here to enhance Scotland, migration must be managed. I am mindful of the necessity to maintain community cohesion and public services and the need for new arrivals to support themselves and their dependants. We want the right people with the right skills who can make the right contribution to Scottish society to work and study here. That's why we are controlling immigration more tightly and tackling abuse, while identifying the most talented workers for the Scottish economy. Ours is a fair and transparent system. It is a system which allows potential migrants to measure their chances of success against the criteria before applying. Finally, it is a system which aims to reduce failed applications and the misery of failed asylum seekers.

We are citizens of an interdependent global world, at the centre of international networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Bebo. Young Scots, like their ancestors, want to embrace the wider world. I want them to travel on gap years, to learn skills and experience overseas as graduates. But I want them to come back, armed with the new skills and wider networks by which to underpin Scotland's future economic success in fast-moving times. Scotland is going to become more diverse over the coming decades. The new faces of different heritages will help to make Scotland that little bit younger.

Jim Murphy MP is Secretary of State for Scotland