Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 08 June 2021
Welcome to your new role, Presiding Officer. I welcome the new cabinet secretary to her role, too, and I thank her—or, I assume that I will thank her—in that regard.
It is clearly impressed on MSPs that it is our collective duty to use every means at our disposal to address poverty inequalities. With renewed ambition, I believe that the Scottish Government will tackle that pervasive and contracted issue head-on. It is within the capacity of all parties, building on the work of the past five years, to reduce poverty over this parliamentary session to bring more children out of poverty. The effect of that will be to break cycles of poverty that have gone on for generations.
I welcome the report, “Poverty in Scotland 2021: towards a 2030 without poverty”. I am grateful to the Child Poverty Action Group, the Scottish poverty and inequality research unit, I-SPHERE—the Institute for Social Policy, Housing, Equalities Research—and the Poverty Alliance for their tremendous efforts in leading on and pulling together that extensive work. The report provides direction for policy makers. I will draw attention to a couple of areas: fair work and housing.
Fair work is a core aspect of tackling poverty head-on and building a prosperous and productive nation. Fundamentally, it consists of dignity in work. That means that we do not support business models that exploit loopholes and which have in place abusive power dynamics. The excessive power dynamic of business above employee needs to be tackled in Scotland. For example, the rise in zero-hours contracts, as highlighted by the “Fair Work in Scotland” report, is worrying.
Helen Martin also highlighted that in her contribution to the “Poverty in Scotland 2021” report, and she explains how the Covid pandemic has laid bare the unfairness in our economy, with low earners, young workers, and black and ethnic minority workers being impacted on to a disproportionate extent. Often, those groups are exploited in unfair work dynamics—for example, by being made to sign waivers so that they work over the maximum working hours, with no recourse to speak against that because of the fear of job loss. That leads to exploitative conditions and hours, without fair pay or fair compensation.
Obviously, fair wages must allow workers to maintain a decent quality of life. That needs to, and must, apply both to single people and to people with families to support. I back the call in the “Poverty in Scotland 2021” report that employers, trade unions and Government collaboratively establish fair work structures in the Scottish economy.
I also welcome the finding that the proportion of people who are earning below the living wage has decreased. However, wages should never have been at that level, so much more still needs to be done to address the issue.
Housing is another core aspect of reducing poverty. Another contributor to the “Poverty in Scotland 2021” report, Tony Cain, impressed on us the importance of understanding housing primarily as a human right and not as a welfare activity. A combined approach of building more good-quality affordable housing and capping foreign investment that purposely drives up costs in the rental sector or superficially inflates house prices would be welcome. Analysis suggests that poverty is lower in Scotland than it is in the rest of the UK because of lower housing costs. Housing must be protected and improved as a means of reducing poverty.
I take this opportunity to thank some of the incredible organisations in my Glasgow Anniesland constituency that are working head-on to break cycles of poverty. They include Whiteinch Transformation, Hope Connections, DRC Generations, Drumchapel food bank, 3D Drumchapel, Christians Against Poverty Whiteinch and LINKES. Those organisations have made an incredible impact and have brought hope and practical support to the Anniesland area.
I look forward to working with colleagues of all parties with the intention of accelerating poverty reduction during this parliamentary session.
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