Immigration is a reserved matter, meaning the power to legislate on immigration matters resides solely at Westminster.
"What has emerged most clearly in the course of the scoping work is a wealth of enthusiasm and tangible urgency regarding the need to develop more policy capacity on migration in Scotland. The gap in the infrastructure is seen widely as self-evident. Two organisations have reported having considered developing policy capacity themselves recently in response, but decided against stepping into that role because it is outside their remit and expertise. The sense of an increasingly urgent need for more migration policy capacity looks set to increase the further the Scottish and UK government’s approaches diverge. It will be greatly exacerbated by the end of free movement in 2021.
However, the scoping yielded far less clarity on how capacity on migration policy should be built and no clear way forward emerges from the responses. This exercise has nonetheless brought together thinking on the prospects for such migration policy work in Scotland, the challenges it faces and the opportunities it offers. This can help inform deliberations for how to go about building policy capacity. Some ways forward will be better suited to addressing particular difficulties or taking advantages of certain opportunities than others, although no single form provides all of the solutions.
[A] table ... tries to provide an objective assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the three main options. These are not exhaustive and there is nothing to preclude funding a mixture of different approaches. However, there should be consideration of the fact that some policy functions sit better together than others. In each case there is the option of providing additional resource to existing organisations or setting up something new. Both options have drawbacks: existing organisations may find it difficult to properly incorporate a new remit, while setting up a new organisation requires establishing appropriate governance, operations, networks and profile. Funding policy capacity across a range of organisations is also possibility, but care should be taken to ensure these roles have a means of co-ordinating and co-operating, rather than competing."