Controversial Green MSP Q Manivannan gets to stay... for now

Controversial Green MSP Q Manivannan has been handed a new visa by the Home Office , he claims, allowing him to stay in the UK for a further three years. The Indian transgender activist was installed as a regional MSP in May without standing for election or knowing how long he would be allowed to remain in the country. His case has been at the centre of an ongoing debate over whether foreign nationals without permanent residency should be allowed to become legislators. Manivannan, who is now on a salary of £77,711, claims his temporary student visa has recently been upgraded by the UK Government to a three-year graduate one. However, the extension still doesn’t guarantee he can see out the parliamentary term. The 30-year-old said: 'I recently received my graduate visa as planned, after going through an extractive and expensive immigration system - one where applicants are made to pay thousands of pounds for the right to live and work in Scotland. Q Manivannan has been awarded a new visa by the Home Office 'My focus is where it always has been, on serving my constituents. This is my home and I'm not going anywhere.” 'In just the past few months, I along with my Green colleagues have been getting on with our jobs. 'We have worked on a range of issues from ensuring fair work in arts and culture and establishing an artist minimum income, securing better and more flexible access to childcare, and standing steadfastly against AI hyperscale data centre applications in Edinburgh and beyond.' Manivannan has had only one brush with public opinion and was rejected by voters in an Edinburgh council ward last year. Nonetheless, he became an MSP for Edinburgh and Lothians East at May's Holyrood election under proportional representation rules as the party placed him third on its list of top-up candidates. Scottish Conservative MSP Stephen Kerr said: 'This was an electoral con. The Scottish Greens showed contempt for voters by putting forward a candidate whose permission to remain in the UK did not cover the five-year term they were seeking. 'A three-year graduate visa leaves that fundamental problem unresolved. Voters still have no certainty that Q Manivannan will be able to remain here throughout this Parliament. The electoral law that permits this shambles must change.’ Thomas Kerr, Reform UK's deputy leader in Scotland, told the Daily Telegraph that Manivannan’s new visa 'does not erase the absurdity of a foreign national with no indefinite right to remain voting on Scottish legislation'. Privately-schooled Manivannan moved to Scotland in 2021 to take a PhD in international relations at St Andrews University. In May, he appealed for help to fund his application for a graduate visa despite owning a property in India worth up to £250,000. The Home Office said it doesn't comment on individual cases.