Child Poverty - It Shouldn't Happen Here

I was shocked to hear the news today that there are 3.5 million children living in poverty in the UK.  And the figures are set to soar in the coming years. 

Today Save the Children has published its report ‘Child Poverty in the UK in 2012: It Shouldn’t Happen Here’, which has found that the UK’s poorest children are bearing the brunt of the recession. 

The report is based on a survey of parents and children, and I welcome the opportunity to expose the voices which are so often hidden from the debate which rages over the economy.  One of the most telling things which it has exposed is the extent to which children are aware of financial hardship. 

The Coalition Government says it is committed to eradicating child poverty by 2020, but it’s difficult to see the evidence of this when figures like these are revealed. 

I’m pleased to see children and families getting a voice through this report, but it just shows the impact which austerity measures are having.  It’s difficult to believe that children in the UK are going to school hungry, without adequate clothing, every day.  We must do all we can to help those without a voice. 

That’s why I support the proposals for not just a minimum wage, but a living wage.  I welcome the consultation into the Living Wage (Scotland) Bill and look forward to contributing to this in the next few weeks.

UK Government breaks the law on Child Poverty Act?

The long-awaited UK child poverty strategy is to be published before the UK Parliament breaks for Easter recess today. This document will lay out how the UK Government, alongside Scottish, Welsh, Northern Irish and local government counterparts, will reach the targets of eradicating child poverty by 2020.

This week it has emerged that the Child Poverty Action Group has written to senior Government ministers criticising the late arrival of the strategy, which should have been published by 25 March 2011. They've already missed that deadline, but the Government has assured MPs that the strategy will be published before the recess.

It is not just the date of release that the Government is dragging its heels on. The 2010 Act requires a commission to be set up, whose role includes giving advice on the writing of the UK strategy. DWP minister Maria Miller, recently wrote that "our plans for establishing a Commission will be set out in the Child Poverty Strategy, to be published shortly." This is the wrong way round! The independent commission was intended to inform the writing of the strategy, and to scrutinise the proposals, not to be set up after the strategy has been published.

I hope that this, along with Save the Children's recent concern that the recent UK Budget announcement failed to address child poverty, isn't an indication of this issue dropping further down the list of priorities of our government. Both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats supported the Child Poverty Act when they were in opposition: so what is causing this reticence to comply now?
To take the challenge of tackling child poverty in this country seriously, the UK Government needs to be serious about implementing this law. I wait with interest for their response.

The social price our children will pay

As public spending cuts loom and the news present us with huge quantities of information about the impact of those cuts I am convinced that our children will be seriously affected.


According to the Scottish Government 21 % of children in Scotland live in poverty. As the Coalition Government forges ahead on an ideological stand to reduce the deficit at record-breaking speed, services will get cut, people will be made redundant and many more children will face life within a jobless household.

Neither children nor the unemployed pay taxes, but a social price will be paid by both; for children this will be at school. Not all children arrive on an equal standing to primary school. Poverty breeds educational under-achievement. Scotland is understandably proud of its educational system but influential studies have noted the chronic under-achievement of children from the poorest families. Children from more advantaged households significantly outperform children from less advantaged homes and the gap increases as they grow up. There is a national commitment through the Child Poverty Act 2010 to eradicate child poverty by 2020. Will this commitment be scrapped as a result of the cuts?

The Church of Scotland has had a long commitment towards eliminating child poverty in Scotland and is in full support of The Better Odds at School campaign to be launched today by Save the Children. The campaign proposes to address the under-achievement gap by investing in extra resources for schools to support children in poverty. These resources are not called for in isolation, but as part of a strategy that targets under-achievement from early years onwards and that recognises the need to support parents in helping their children achieve their full educational potential. We need campaigns and actions like these to prevent our children from becoming collateral damage of the spending review.