by Joe Rossiter, Daily Mail
A newly-elected transgender Green MSP had pleaded for cash to help them apply for a visa to work in the UK before Thursday’s vote.
Q Manivannan, 29, began a fundraiser for a temporary graduate visa before their election to Holyrood as an MSP this week.
Dr Manivannan, a non-binary Indian immigrant who came to Scotland in 2021, sent messages to party colleagues asking them to donate to a fundraiser seeking to collect £2,089 for the visa, which would allow them three years to work and live in the UK.
A newly-elected regional list MSP who stood in Edinburgh and Lothian East, Dr Manivannan said the time-limited right to stay in the country would allow them to save for the £5,047 cost of applying for a global talent visa.
After winning a Holyrood seat, they said: ‘My name is Dr Q Manivannan, I am a transgender Tamil immigrant, my pronouns are they/them. I am to some in this country everything that the hateful despise and I am standing here as your MSP now with care.’
They added: ‘Every barrier placed before me with the Greens was the reason also that we pushed further.
‘This is what diversity looks like in power.’
Former Conservative MSP Sue Webber, who failed to win a seat on Friday, had previously said: ‘Voters will be astonished that this candidate doesn’t even know if they will be able to stay in the country going forward.’