Deportation is at the behest of Home Office

Sir, What a curious and confused message is conveyed in the letter from David Gallant ( The Oban Times, May 4).

Mr Gallant suggests that the Canadian family who invested so much time, money and effort into transforming the Laggan Stores are victims of EU legislation and are but one of many other instances, and we know of several others, where families and individuals from outwith the EU are faced with deportation.

Mr Gallant claims we should respond to this discrimination by pursuing a ‘hard’ Brexit and refuse to trade with our EU neighbours and should impose a total ban on imports from EU members. He deplores racial discrimination and yet he suggests that we should practice it.

In truth, the move to expel the family from Laggan – and they have already, to our shame, gone – is entirely at the behest of the UK Home Office and despite strenuous efforts on their behalf by the local MP and his colleagues. Clearly, discretion exists to allow nationals from outwith the EU to remain. Were this not so, the NHS throughout the country would be on its knees and many other aspects of our services would be under even more strain than at present.

It is salutary to reflect that a former Home Secretary is now Prime Minister and that in her previous role she headed the most intransigent and unsympathetic department of government – and so it remains.

We should be taking steps now and without delay to regularise the status of foreign nationals from the EU and from elsewhere who are contributing tangibly to our economy. They help greatly to counteract the demography of Scotland and add greatly to our society. Ken MacColl, Villa Road, Oban.