March 2025

The Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland are pleased to be able to provide input to the Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights.

Established by the Commissioner for Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2003, the Commissioner is responsible for promoting and safeguarding the rights of all children and young people in Scotland, giving particular attention to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). The Commissioner is fully independent of the Scottish Government and has powers to review law, policy and practice and to take action to promote and protect rights.  We have focussed our submission on better tackling child poverty in Scotland.

We agree with the general aims of the report by the Special Rapporteur which challenges the prevailing growth-centric development model and instead advocates ‘for a shift to a human rights-based economy that prioritizes poverty eradication and the reduction of inequalities, as well as access to public services (education, health and housing) and the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment’.[1]

In Scotland, we see that there are many challenges to tackling child poverty, it is clear that bold and far-reaching policy decisions are needed. These actions are of course also affected by global trends and relations. Looking at child poverty solely within a Scottish context will only take us so far.

Child poverty in Scotland is a persistent challenge. The latest Scottish Government statistics show 240,000 children (24% of children) were living in relative poverty after housing costs in 2020.[2] In 2020-23, 70% of children in relative poverty after housing costs were living in working households, showing that in work poverty is still a very real issue.[3]

The Scottish Government identified six priority family types in which children are at a greater risk of poverty and collectively around 90% of children in poverty are in households from at least one priority family type.[4]

These priority family types are:

• Lone-parent families, the large majority of which are headed by women

• Families which include a disabled adult or child

• Larger families, with three or more children

• Minority ethnic families

• Families with a child under one year old

• Families where the mother is under 25 years of age

Within Scotland, the Government has set targets to reduce child poverty, with statutory obligations on Scottish Ministers. The Child Poverty (Scotland) Act 2017 set four statutory targets for 2030:

• Less than 10% of children in relative poverty

• Less than 5% in absolute poverty

• Less than 5% in combined low-income and material deprivation

• Less than 5% in persistent poverty

The Act also requires the Government to produce annual reports showing progress and to set out delivery plans every four years towards meeting the child poverty targets.

Still, we see that these policies are not always prioritised and forecasting shows that the Scottish Government is unlikely to meet these targets without significant work.[5] It was recently confirmed that the interim targets were missed.[6]

Devolution means that not all decision-making power is held within the remit of the Scottish Government, many of the social security benefits are reserved to Westminster. The division of powers between the UK and Scottish governments is structured through the Scotland Act 1998. This creates a complex landscape where responsibilities and approaches can overlap or conflict. There is increasing divergence at present as the UK Government have announced plans to restrict disability benefits, which will have an impact in Scotland. Around 40% of children in households experiencing poverty live with at least one disabled person so the impact of these policy decisions will be felt.[7]

Recently, we have been collating the views of children experiencing poverty in Scotland and using them to inform our asks. We have shared our policy calls here to give an idea of our priorities to address child poverty in Scotland.

Summary of Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland key policy calls

• Poverty reduction targets, measures and timescales should be aligned between the UK and Scottish Governments with clear lines of responsibility and accountability. In Scotland, we have poverty targets in legislation, this is not the case for the UK as a whole and we would like to see this, to increase accountability.
• There must be ongoing participation mechanisms for children and families’ priorities to be reflected in poverty action plans. We want there to be meaningful opportunities for children and young people to participate in shaping policy and to hold the government to account on progress.
• There is a need to radically simplify the social security system to ensure it is easy to access and that barriers to entitlement are removed. Within Scotland and the UK the social security system is incredibly complex and often being navigated by individuals with language barriers or disabilities.
• There is a need to reduce stigmatising language and policy around people eligible for social security and reframe poverty as an issue of economic injustice.
• We believe that raising household income is the quickest way to address child poverty.
• We have repeatedly urged the UK Government to lift the two-child benefit cap. Removing this limit would pull many thousands of children out of absolute poverty. It is an investment to offset the true costs of poverty. This is a controversial policy which means that certain child related benefits are only payable for the first two children in a family – this was introduced in 2017, and it means that no matter how many children are in a family they do not receive more benefits. This disproportionately affects families from ethnic minority communities who often have larger families with 3 or more children.[8]
• We have urged the UK Government to remove the benefit cap, removing the two-child limit will not in itself be sufficient without also removing the cap on benefits. This disproportionately impacts large families, or families with disabled children. Putting in place such a limit means that families do not receive the amount they may be assessed as needing. There is a cap on the total amount of social security a family can receive – this means that even if the benefit entitlement was more, it would be capped at a certain stage.
• The UK and Scottish governments should continue to commit to raising benefits in line with inflation to reduce the continuing impact of the cost-of-living crisis.
• Increase Scottish child payment, this is currently around £26 per week per child, this should be raised to £40. This is an additional payment which is paid to parents of children in Scotland and is means tested. Many child poverty organisations have called for this to be increased to offset the effects of child poverty. It has recently been shown that raising this benefit is one of the most effective ways for the Scottish Government to lower child poverty.[9]
• Removal of no recourse to public funds condition. This is applicable to those seeking asylum within the UK – conditions are placed on them that they cannot use public funds – nor can they work. This limits their income and asylum-seeking children and young people account for a significant proportion for families experiencing poverty.
• A lack of affordable childcare is a barrier to parental employment, the costs of this can often outweigh the money received from employment. We note that the Special Rapporteur report highlights that a focus on increasing GDP of a country obscures the importance of domestic and care work. There is a clear need to better value this. Where parents do work there are cost barriers to obtaining childcare and a lack of suitable provision.
• We call for the provision of adequate, secure and suitable housing for all children in Scotland. This encompasses a range of policies including: the need for more social housing, especially that suitable for larger families and for disabled children, rent caps, and an end to placing children in unsuitable temporary housing. Within Scotland around 10,000 children are currently living in temporary accommodation.
• End the use of hotel type accommodation for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and age-disputed children.
• Mitigate against rising energy prices which place a significant pressure on household finances. Maintain the energy price cap at affordable levels, social security benefits should be enough for families to cover costs.
• Review thresholds and extend eligibility for the provision of free school meals.
• Debts to public bodies should not be recovered in a way which acts against children’s rights. This can include council tax payments, rent arrears or school meal debt. End the enforcement of debt collection which has a negative effect on children’s rights.  
• The third sector needs to be properly and fairly funded if we are to end child poverty. They provide vital public services, they are often front line and reach children and families in ways other services do not. Fair funding is also important to address in work poverty among third sector workers, ensuring that employees are given job security and services can be delivered reliably (through long term funding) and allowing a living wage to be paid.
• Align policies with the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child Concluding Observations for the UK.

[1] Eradicating poverty beyond growth – Olivier De Schutter

[2] Scottish Government Poverty and Income Inequality in Scotland 2020-2023, 2024 – https://data.gov.scot/poverty/

[3] Poverty in Scotland – Poverty & Inequality Commission

[4] Poverty rates amongst priority family types – Tackling child poverty priority families overview – gov.scot

[5] Is Scotland going to meet its child poverty targets?

[6] Child poverty in Scotland falls – gov.scot

[7] Scottish Government, Every Child every chance, Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan: Third Year Progress Report (2020-21) Annex B: Child Poverty in Families with a disabled Adult or child, 2021.

[8] Minority ethnic families – Tackling child poverty priority families overview – gov.scot

[9] Policy packages to meet Scotland’s child poverty targets | FAI