Hansard

Eradicating child poverty is this Government’s defining mission. As the First Minister has made clear since his appointment in May, our ambition is not to tackle or reduce child poverty but to eradicate it completely. There will never be an acceptable number of children in poverty.

Today, I have published the Scottish Government’s annual progress report on child poverty for 2023-24. It reflects the latest update in the implementation of “Best Start, Bright Futures: Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2022-2026” and the latest data on poverty levels, which we published in March. The Poverty and Inequality Commission has also published its annual scrutiny, for which I am grateful. We will give careful and on-going consideration to its recommendations.

Our ambition to eradicate child poverty requires each and every one of us in the chamber to work together, because, when it comes to tackling poverty, which is something that we should all have common cause and common purpose in, the past year has been one of considerable challenge. Families have continued to experience the devastating consequences of 14 years of austerity, Brexit sending prices soaring and the United Kingdom Government’s economic mismanagement and harmful welfare policies. The costs of essential goods are still much higher than they were three years ago and continue to rise.

Although the Scottish National Party Government is pulling out all the stops to protect people from cruel Westminster decisions, our powers remain severely limited. We are acting with one hand tied behind our back, which prevents us from investing as much as we would like in our vital public services and going further with anti-poverty measures. Against the most challenging financial settlement under devolution, this Government is delivering almost £3 billion to support people through the cost of living crisis and £134 million in 2024-25 to combat Westminster austerity through mitigations.

Our support for children in low-income households has continued to rise, increasing to almost £1.4 billion in the past year. To put that in context, it is more than two and a half times the amount that we invested in 2018-19, which was the first year following the passing of the Child Poverty (Scotland) Bill.

Let me be very clear. When we choose to invest, our support is consistently undermined by Westminster’s punitive policies. When we choose the Scottish child payment, the UK Government chooses a two-child cap. When we choose to roll out the carer support payment, the Department for Work and Pensions forces carers to repay £250 million. When we choose to deliver the independent living fund, the UK Government plans a £4 billion cut to welfare support.

Options were limited when our budget for 2023-24 was slashed by the Tory Government. The block grant was worth 4.8 per cent less than it was in 2022-23, when the budget was set. As such, we have had to make difficult decisions to prioritise our limited resources where they can have the greatest impact.

Today’s report also presents the latest data on child poverty relating to 2022-23. Poverty levels are considered to be broadly stable when looking at a three-year average, with levels remaining above the interim targets that were set. Although single-year figures show a rise in child poverty across three measures, including relative poverty, it is important to note that those figures do not yet capture the full impact of the expansion of the game-changing Scottish child payment and its increase to £25 per week from November 2022.

We know that our action is making a difference. Modelling that was published in February estimates that our policies will keep 100,000 children out of relative poverty this year, with levels of relative poverty 10 percentage points lower than they would otherwise have been.

This year’s annual progress report on child poverty marks the mid-point of “Best Start, Bright Futures”. Of the 108 actions reported on, 60 are complete or are delivering at scale, which is an increase of 20 on the same time last year. A further 34 actions are in progress and nine are in the early stages of development. Over the past year, our policies have continued to make a real difference to people’s lives.

Throughout 2023, the SNP Government continued to provide immediate support through the likes of our game-changing Scottish child payment, awarding almost £430 million to families. More than 329,000 children had benefited from that unique Scottish support as of 31 March this year.

Having already increased our Scottish child payment in value by 25 per cent from November 2022, we increased the value of all other benefits by 10.1 per cent from April 2023, ensuring that families keep their real-terms buying power. Of course, our Scottish child payment is part of a wider package that includes the three best start grants and best start foods, which, since launch, have provided more than £829 million in vital financial support at key moments in a child’s life. In Scotland, there is no cap on the number of children in one family who can receive those payments—and, under an SNP Government, there never will be.

As a result of our decisions to protect the most vulnerable, our total investment in social security benefits and payments increased to an estimated £5.3 billion in 2023-24. That is over £890 million more than is received from the UK Government for social security.

We continue to build on the progress to date. In February, we widened eligibility for best start foods. We removed income thresholds from qualifying benefits so that an estimated 20,000 more children and pregnant women can benefit. We published new guidance to support local authorities in continuing to mitigate the benefit cap as fully as possible within the scope of devolved powers. It has been estimated that that will help more than 2,500 families with more than 8,900 children. Almost three quarters of those families are lone parent families.

Investment in front-line no one left behind employability services continued to grow, with more than 4,700 parents receiving support between April and December 2023. We continued to work to develop a system of school-age childcare to benefit around 4,400 children and support more parents to access employment. That is on top of continuing the provision of free bus travel for 727,000 children and young people.

In recognition of the importance of warm and affordable housing as the foundation for family life, we delivered a further 6,045 affordable homes across Scotland between April and December 2023, of which 4,358 were for social rent.

We have also continued our work that is focused on delivering transformational change in the longer term, including through our continued investment in the whole family wellbeing programme and through our place-based collaborations in Glasgow, Dundee and Clackmannanshire.

The First Minister has made it clear that eradicating child poverty is the Government’s driving mission. In the year ahead, we will unashamedly and relentlessly focus on delivering on existing investments as well as taking new steps on change required. Our action is underpinned by our progressive approach to taxation and strengthened by the Verity house agreement, which cements tackling child poverty as one of three strategic priorities with our local authority partners.

The report that was published today sets out priority actions that we will take to drive forward progress in eradicating child poverty, with further action to be set out in our forthcoming programme for government. However, we have already outlined some key steps.

Responding to the calls of the Aberlour Child Care Trust children’s charity and others, we have announced the opening of a £1.5 million fund that is focused on removing the burden of school meal debt from families. We have committed £16 million across this year and next year to expand access to childcare services within six early adopter community projects. That supports the development of local childcare systems that are designed to meet families’ needs.

The budget challenge that was faced last year has meant that it has not been possible to invest in all the action that we would have wished to invest in, and, with the UK Government’s spring budget delivering yet another hammer blow to Scotland’s finances, our policy ambitions face real challenges.

Last month, the Government declared a housing emergency in Scotland. Although we continue to do everything that we can within devolved powers to address levels of homelessness and deliver the supply of social and affordable housing, the reality of an almost 9 per cent cut to Scotland’s capital budget coupled with the impact of high inflation and Brexit is hampering our housing sector.

We have pledged to work constructively and in good faith with the UK Government and local authorities across Scotland to consider what more can be done. However, as a first step, an incoming UK Government must commit to reversing the cut to Scotland’s capital budget.

The challenges go deeper. Labour’s shadow health secretary, Wes Streeting, has said:

“all roads ... lead back to Westminster”.

Last month, the First Minister wrote to Sir Keir Starmer and called on him to commit to working with us in our ambition to eradicate child poverty, because the reality is that every progressive measure that is put in place in Scotland simply cannot go on being cancelled out by punitive Westminster welfare policies. We need the next UK Government, of whatever colour, to reset relations on welfare, to be bold, and to take early action to match Scotland’s ambition. That includes making key changes to welfare policies, such as by introducing an essentials guarantee and abolishing the two-child limit, which could lift an estimated 40,000 children in Scotland out of poverty overnight.

Eradicating child poverty is a moral imperative and an economic necessity. Our actions are making a difference, with modelling estimating that 100,000 children will be kept out of poverty this year through our policies. However, we must continue to go further and faster to deliver the change that is needed ahead of 2030.