We need to be bolder to reduce child poverty
Figures released last week show that progress on reducing child poverty in Scotland has stalled. For the families walking a financial tightrope every day, struggling to provide even the basics for their kids, this simply isn’t good enough.
Relative child poverty (after housing costs) remains stubbornly high at 24% for the period 2020-23. This means that there are still a staggering 240,000 children in Scotland facing the harms of poverty every day. Whether that’s going to school with an empty stomach, going to bed cold, or missing out on valuable opportunities to learn, play, and experience the joys of childhood.
If we look beyond the headline figure, we can see that things are even worse for certain families. For minority ethnic families, the poverty rate is 43%; 38% of larger families are in poverty, and 38% of single-parent households. This is scandalous.
Worryingly, there is no new data on the levels of poverty in families with a baby under one or families with a young parent due to sample sizes being too small. We know that having a young baby is a particularly expensive time and that the price of baby formula has been one of the essential items worst-hit by inflation. While the situation for these families could have improved, there’s every chance that it has in fact gotten worse.
We know the Scottish Child Payment is helping families but it’s simply not enough
Although we haven’t yet seen progress on child poverty rates, we know that certain policies introduced by the Scottish Government, like the Scottish Child Payment (SCP), are helping families through tough times. But if it’s not making a dent in the rates of child poverty in the current climate, it’s sadly not going far enough.
A mum in Edinburgh told us this month:
“The Scottish Child Payment is amazing – it helps me buy food and clothes. Sometimes I put a bit towards my energy bills too. But everything is so expensive, like silly expensive, so I don’t have near enough for everything I need. I work full time [when not on maternity leave] and I can’t keep forking out cash that I don’t have. It’s the thing I think about the most and the stress is really not good for me. And it’s depressing that even working really hard for your family sometimes doesn’t pay off. I’m just getting into debt and it gets me so down.”
We wanted and needed to see more progress
Given these recent statistics say child poverty has not improved, it’s becoming increasingly unlikely that Scotland will meet its interim child poverty targets next year. In the period from 2020-23, which the latest stats refer to, the SCP had been fully rolled out to under 6s and had been increased to £20. While the full impact of the rollout of the SCP to under 16s and the increase to £25 will show up in next year’s stats, it does not look likely that this will lead to the reductions we need to reach the targets. Despite significant commitments to date, with no clear action plan of bold political choices or next steps, the road to 2030 is looking very rocky.
Disappointing figures must be a catalyst for further action across the Scottish Parliament
As a start, the First Minister must build on the impact of the SCP so far and stick to the promise he made during his leadership campaign to increase the SCP to £30 per week, on a path to £40 within the lifetime of this parliament.
The reality is that hundreds of thousands of children are being denied the childhood they deserve. Everyone in Scotland wants to see this change and it is on the Scottish Government and the wider Scottish Parliament to make sure we see the change we need.
