Scottish Greens leader Ross Greer has said that Reform is planning to construct ‘actual concentration camps’ to house migrants and asylum seekers in Scotland.
He made the comments in response to plans from Nigel Farage and Reform UK to build migrant detention camps in places that elect Green MPs at Westminster.
Reform later confirmed that the policy would apply north of the border, meaning constituencies like Edinburgh Central, which looks likely to elect a Green MSP, could have detention camps if Reform wins power.
Reform says that this is due to the Greens’ support for ‘open borders and an infinite number of undocumented men’, but Greer described this as a naked attempt to intimidate Scottish Green voters.
Speaking to journalists during a campaign, he said: ‘Reform are openly threatening voters, whether it’s Edinburgh Central, Glasgow Southside, or people who intend to vote Green, either on the regional list here in Scotland, or down south in the English council elections, this is Donald Trump-style politics.
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‘Donald Trump is the kind of guy who threatens people who vote for his political opponents, tries to punish them.’
He added: ‘I don’t think voters across Scotland are going to take kindly to being threatened by Nigel Farage like this. We are proud of the fact that the Greens are standing on a platform of offering solidarity and sanctuary to those who need it.’
Greer was unequivocal when describing how he views Reform’s detention centres: ‘We’re very clear that where people have come into our communities, either as immigrants or asylum seekers, they should be housed in actual housing, not kept essentially locked up in these hotels, or, as Reform are proposing, actual concentration camps.
‘They are talking about migrant detention camps. The other word for that is a concentration camp.’
He added: ‘There’s a difference between a concentration camp and what you’re alluding to, which is, I presume, a death camp, an extermination camp. Clearly, those are different things by definition. These are concentration camps.
‘Remember, Britain invented concentration camps during the Boer War. What Reform is proposing is a concentration camp, a camp where you detain and concentrate a group of people. That is evil – that is genuinely wicked politics.’
Following an announcement by Reform home affairs spokesman Zia Yusuf that the party, if elected, would ‘prioritise Green constituencies and Green-controlled councils to locate these detention centres’, Glasgow City Reform councillor Thomas Kerr confirmed the plans would apply in Scotland.
He said: “Ross Greer and his army of crackpots’ pursuit of open borders, which would allow swathes of foreign criminals to enter Scotland unchecked, is not only economically reckless but a danger to national security.
‘But, let’s not kid ourselves, John Swinney’s entire future hinges on these extremists, so Scotland needs to know what they are getting. If the Greens are so keen to welcome these people, then they can take responsibility and put them up in their own constituencies.
‘The choice is clear: Vote Green, get illegals.’
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