Chamber and committees

I thank the cabinet secretary for that answer. I have been undertaking a road safety survey in the East Dunbartonshire part of my constituency. A common theme arising from the data has been the safety of cyclists on our roads. In part, that will be due to the tragic death of a cyclist in Bearsden North earlier in the year. Can the cabinet secretary advise what work the Scottish Government has done to encourage safe cycling and to promote greater respect for cyclists on our roads?

[Inaudible.]—for 20mph speed limits.

Good morning, panel members. You will know from sitting in during the previous evidence session that we are looking to hear your thoughts about the financial and resource estimates that are attached to the financial memorandum. I got a sense from the earlier session that the figure of £1 million is a huge underestimate; I pop that out there for your thoughts. Perhaps Eddie McConnell can start.

Thank you for your comments.

It feels as if good work is constrained by finance.

Does anyone else want to come in and share their views?

Thank you; that is really helpful.

Good morning. The committee is looking for the panel members’ thoughts on the financial and resource estimates in the financial memorandum. Tressa Burke, as you touched on the issue earlier, and I got the feeling that you had much more to say but that you felt that your time was constrained, and because it was your organisation that raised concerns that the funding that is required for the disability commissioner could be diverted away from other public policies that are aimed at disabled people, I will give you the opportunity to come in on that issue first.

I am about to conclude.

Every child should be able to thrive and reach their full potential. It is clear to me and many others that if Westminster is not willing to play its part in eradicating child poverty, real change will come only when Scotland is independent.

I am pleased to speak in the debate. I welcome the First Minister’s commitment to eradicating child poverty. In my remarks I will concentrate on how social security can have an impact on such poverty. I will also share some of the evidence that the Parliament’s Social Justice and Social Security Committee has received on the impact of the Scottish child payment.

Child poverty is a stark reality for many children and families. The compassion that we have for the welfare of our children is something that should define our country.

It is clear that the Scottish Government’s actions are already making a difference. Modelling that was published in February estimates that the SNP Scottish Government’s policies will keep 100,000 children out of relative poverty this year. Almost £430 million has been put in the pockets of families through the Scottish child payment, which is supporting more than 329,000 children. That is a significant intervention that is making a real difference to the lives of many people across Scotland. As a member of the Social Justice and Social Security Committee, I have heard from many witnesses about the impact of the Scottish child payment. For example, in evidence, Professor Danny Dorling of the University of Oxford said:

“I started looking at the statistics in the late 1980s, when Scotland had some of the worst rates of child poverty in the UK. Now, according to the simple poverty line proportion, every region in England is worse than Scotland.”—[Official Report, Social Justice and Social Security Committee, 23 May 2024; c 17.]

Unfortunately, however, we also heard that the full potential of the payment is being held back by the UK welfare cuts. Ruth Boyle of the Poverty Alliance was clear about that. She told the committee that

“right now, the UK system is actually pulling people into poverty. We know that 90 per cent of people who are in receipt of universal credit are going without essentials”.—[Official Report, Social Justice and Social Security Committee, 30 May 2024; c 10.]

We received damaging evidence about the two-child policy and the abhorrent rape clause, and how it is directly affecting children. Professor Ruth Patrick of the University of York advised us that,

“it is common to hear parents talking about trying to protect their children from the impact of poverty. They will say, ‘I’ll skip a meal because I don’t want my children to go without,’ but what we find with the impact of the two-child limit is that parents are reporting that their children are trying to protect them from the impact of the poverty. They report examples where children are not telling their parents that they need a new pair of school shoes because they know that the money is not there. We have evidence of people being in supermarkets with children telling their siblings, ‘Don’t ask mummy for that, she doesn’t have the money.’”—[Official Report, Social Justice and Social Security Committee, 23 May 2024; c 19-20.]

If we are to have an honest debate about child poverty, we must consider the harm that is being done to children by those policies. The human impact of Westminster policy is appalling and considerable.

The Child Poverty Action Group recently highlighted a case from its early warning system, of a working couple with three children who had had their universal credit

“reduced by the 2 child limit and a deduction for rent arrears.”

The family was not able

“to get a cake or any presents”

for

“their youngest child’s birthday”,

and the family

“hoped the child would be too young to remember.”

That is heartbreaking, but those are real cases. That callous approach, which erodes dignity and denies children a basic level of subsistence and enshrines misery, must end.

It is not just the two-child policy that is holding back progress; other policies including the bedroom tax and the benefit cap are, too. In 2022-23, Scotland spent £84.9 million on 135,625 discretionary housing payment awards to help to mitigate the effects of those policies and others. Although we must do everything that we can with the powers that we have, it is disingenuous in the extreme not to bring to the table in this debate the dreadful impact of a Westminster system that is lacking in compassion and support.

The UK Government now spends £50 billion a year less on social security than it would have spent if cuts, freezes and other charges since 2010 had not happened. CPAG is clear that,

“These cuts have pushed hundreds of thousands of children and families into poverty.”

Whichever party forms the next Westminster Government must, therefore, step up and scrap the two-child policy instead of saying that it can make that policy and the abhorrent rape clause, fairer. The approach of saying, “Trust us—we did good things before” just does not cut it now.

I will get on to that.

As Professor Danny Dorling of Oxford University pointed out,

“the economic inequality between families did not alter one iota in the years from 1997 to 2010.”—[Official Report, Social Justice and Social Security Committee, 23 May 2024; c 8.]

A reference to the so-called new deal for working people is pretty ineffective when the BBC reports that the trade union Unite has failed to endorse Labour’s manifesto. Unite has said that it does not go far enough in protecting workers’ rights.