Delivering for families? A response to Best Start, Bright Futures the Scottish Government’s second Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan

Date: 7th July 2022
Category: Child poverty

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After speaking to 49 parents, JRF and Save the Children have made 50 recommendations on how Scottish Government can address the gaps in its second Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan. These recommendations aim to ensure action does not fall short of ambition to tackle child poverty.

The Plan commits to giving £25 per week per child via the Scottish Child Payment. This will support many children, young people and families. Despite this, other elements within the Plan fall short on either action, scale or urgency. For example, parents shared the need for holistic support to get into or stay in work. Any difficulty raised by parents included the ability to access a workplace where employers are flexible around the needs of looking after a family.

For Scottish Government to address this, recommendations made within the report include:

• Scottish Government refocusing efforts from bringing parents closer to the labour market, to bringing the labour market closer to parents.
• Increase the Scottish Child Payment by above inflation in 2023-24 to ensure the interim targets are met and to help ease the cost of living for families.
• Bring the urgency of the response to the pandemic to the ‘national mission’ to end child poverty.

Read the report in full here.