Parents need support to provide for their children with security and without constant worry. Imagine the UK without any child poverty – a country with all children well fed and housed, feeling secure, and growing up healthy and confident.
A change is coming to child benefit. This Saturday, more families will become eligible as the earnings threshold at which you start losing child benefit increases. The government has finally recognised that ‘the way we treat child benefit in the tax system is confusing and unfair’ and proposed two changes to try to simplify it. It’s ironic that this confusion and unfairness was introduced by the government in the first place.
CPAG in Scotland’s Early Warning System has been operating for ten years! Over Challenge Poverty Week we are looking back at some of the social security events in this period, key findings from the Early Warning System and how they have influenced policy and practise.
Several government ministers have churned out a line about work being the best route out of poverty, but does it hold any truth? The evidence submitted to the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Poverty for its report suggests that this is far from the case.
John Dickie's blog calls on the First Minister must use her Programme for Government to continue to do the right thing, and prioritise protecting children from the immediate cost of living crisis, at the same time as safeguarding the longer term progress needed to meet Scotland’s statutory child poverty targets.