80 young people from across Scotland are meeting with the First Minister for Scotland at the Cost of the School Day Young People’s Summit to set out how they think the Scottish Government should tackle poverty in schools in the coming years.
The Secretary of State’s determination to lift children out of poverty is clear for all to see. The Prime Minister must now unequivocally back the full abolition of the two-child limit in his conference speech tomorrow.
Abolishing the two-child limit is, by far, the most cost-effective way of reducing child poverty, and if done this year will transform the lives of millions of children and families by the end of this parliament.
Hopefully there is now a clear understanding across Government that unless the two-child limit is scrapped, there will be more children in poverty at the end of this parliament than when Labour took office. The policy must go in the Autumn child poverty strategy before the life chances of many more children are damaged on this government’s watch.
Low-income families and disabled people were, at most, an afterthought during the pandemic, with government’s primary intention to support higher income households who had a sudden loss of income, Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) told Baroness Hallett as she chaired the second preliminary hearing of Module 9 of the Covid inquiry today.
This briefing looks at the difference that local authority support and guidance can make to Cost of the School Day approaches in schools. Arlene Black, Pupil Equity Fund Officer with West Lothian Council and Cost of the School Day Lead for the local authority, describes the approach the council has taken to this work, and the impact it is having on children, families and schools.
Latest Welsh government free school meal (FSM) statistics show a fall of 6,000 in the number of children registered for means-tested FSMs in Wales. The fall in the number of children registered means that 25,000 children in poverty in secondary schools now miss out on any form of FSM.
