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I recognise that everyone is under pressure and that there are many competing priorities, but I am still very proud of the work that we have done in partnership with COSLA and the Scottish Refugee Council. I would describe our relationship as very strong. I meet extremely regularly with the new Scots partners—we have met twice this week—and I hope that they would also describe the relationship as strong and positive. The letter that went to the Home Office yesterday, pressing for clarity about the visa issue, came from us all, which shows that our partnership is strong and consistent.

I hope that they will not have a direct impact on Ukrainians living in Scotland, and there are certainly no procedural reasons why they should, given the way that their visas have been issued. My main worry would be about the longer-term visa position and the need to give people clarity as soon as possible, so that they can start to plan and so that we, their employers and councils can also start to plan.

More generally, I am worried about the impact that the new immigration proposals, including the Rwanda bill, the Illegal Migration Act 2023 and the Nationality and Borders Act 2022, will have on how the UK is viewed internationally.

Most Ukrainians with whom I have spoken have been very positive about their experience of being supported and welcomed by Scotland, but I worry about how well we will be able to get across the message about the support that is available here if their first impression of Scotland as part of the UK—for Ukrainians and anyone else seeking safety—is they are not welcome here.

From the beginning, we have been willing to be creative about finding suitable accommodation with wraparound support. We would be willing to explore, as we have done, any ideas and any availability of suitable buildings or space that can be used effectively.

When it comes to MS Ambition and MS Victoria, I went on board one of those boats, as Foysol Choudhury did, and was incredibly impressed with the services that were available. That was an example of temporary accommodation being done well, whereby people were welcomed and given all the support that they required to find longer-term accommodation.

The other one is the Victoria. That shows the success of having that support service on board. Residents had the space and time to explore all their options while they were in supported accommodation. I know that many of them were keen to take up offers, which allowed a group to be able to travel together and then continue to support one another after building up a support network.

I do not know whether we have any figures for the number of people who are in hosted accommodation.

I will bring in Kirstin McPhee on planning for Gaza, because I know that things are moving very quickly there. Although we are very focused on the immediate call for a ceasefire, which is absolutely the correct focus, we have also asked the UK Government to allow us to be part of a humanitarian response for those who want to leave and need to seek a place of safety.

The hosted accommodation is not the most appropriate infrastructure, and it is probably not our first option. However, the homes for Ukraine policy has allowed us to prove that it can work if it is managed correctly. Members will be getting similar correspondence from constituents who want to do their bit and want to help as I have been. Hosting can be a really helpful piece of the puzzle when we are dealing with humanitarian crises, but it is certainly not the immediate fallback.

There has been really positive progress in moving displaced Ukrainians into longer-term accommodation, and the number of people still in temporary welcome accommodation is dropping steadily. We have seen that since the disembarkation of the two ships. Whereas we previously had to keep a lot of welcome accommodation available in case that disembarkation needed some support, we are now able to move away from keeping so many rooms available, which is bringing down the monthly cost of the Ukrainian scheme. That is possible because more and more Ukrainians are finding suitable longer-term accommodation.

It has been paused.

Gosh, there are so many things. There was a positive response, not just through our partnerships with local councils and third sector community groups but in the way that people came forward to support Ukrainians, whether organising collections of aid or money or helping them in other ways. Whenever people heard that a Ukrainian family was moving into an island community, they surrounded it and came together to make sure that those people felt safe and felt that they were a part of the community. In particular, the difference between the 3,000 people that we said that we would take in Scotland and the almost 25,000 that we have ended up with—an incredible number—shows that we can support people when we want to do so.

Absolutely. We have been doing that for the past few months. I have been clear with the UK Government—as has the First Minister—that Scotland stands ready now. If the UK Government makes moves to open a resettlement scheme for people who need to leave Gaza and seek safety, we have been clear that Scotland will do its part to take in refugees and support them in the way that we did Ukrainians. Likewise, we have also been clear that we would use the Scottish NHS to support injured and sick children in Gaza. It is very frustrating that those powers do not lie with us.

During the past few weeks, we have been clear about what an independent Scotland would do differently. We set out what our immigration system would look like, and have been clear that it would be based on treating other humans with dignity, fairness and respect. However, in the meantime, this is the system that we operate in. We have been very clear to the UK Government that, if those routes were opened up, we would be ready.

Labour’s position is not something that I can speak to, but we are certainly keeping an eye on the possibility of a change in Government. For my part, I am willing to work with anyone who might be in a position to give Ukrainians in Scotland that certainty, because it is by far the issue that is raised most often with me and officials when we are out speaking to the Ukrainian community in Scotland.

Members might be aware that I wrote to my Home Office counterpart yesterday, along with COSLA and the Scottish Refugee Council, pressing for that clarity to be provided. I think that the Home Office’s current position is that it has not decided on its preferred option, so it is not yet able to communicate it to us or to Ukrainians living in the UK, but we are in regular communication about it.

I and colleagues in the refugee space in Scotland have been pressing regularly for any kind of timescale or update that we can provide. I know that the uncertainty impacts family and travel plans and it causes people to be hesitant about committing to long-term employment and housing. Everything in their lives is up in the air, so we are very much alive to the issue.

I also know that officials have been working with UK officials to try to move things along. In partnership with the Ukrainian Government, we want to make sure that clarity is provided.