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Child Poverty in Scotland

My hon. Friend is correct. When I taught on the Isle of Mull in the mid-1990s, housing was a particular problem. Children oscillated between various abodes during the year, spending six months in a winter let and then, when the summer season came, moving to a caravan for the summer. I hope that that situation will now come to an end. This subject hits all parties. We can easily throw insults around and say that this lot or that lot are to blame, but such things happen, and we have to do something about them. Poverty is a big issue. In this speech, I can only throw a few shafts of light on it, when it requires floodlights—[Interruption.] Cruelly, the Minister of State, Scotland Office, tells me that I am not even doing that. I strive to do it. Charities, PhDs and professors are working on the subject, but the Scottish Affairs Committee has played its part. It has made at least 20 recommendations, which have been welcomed by many bodies. Barnado’s Scotland estimates that 250,000 children live in poverty and 100,000 live in fuel poverty in Scotland. I shall return to that point. The Child Poverty Action Group in Scotland, like many other groups, has provided an excellent brief for MPs that draws attention to some of the 20 recommendations in the Committee’s report. Recommendation 6 says:"““the tax and benefits system must, at a minimum, ensure that no-one in full time work is living in poverty””." A quarter of children living in poverty have an adult in the family who is in full-time work. The Committee suggested that the minimum wage and tax credits should be raised to address that problem. That reminds me of the evidence given to the Committee on 16 January 2007, 15 months ago, by Professor John Veit-Wilson of Newcastle university, who talked about the working poor. He said that, unfortunately, the UK leads Europe in the average percentage of people leaving low-quality jobs to go back into other low-quality jobs. The working poor remain the working poor. However, he also pointed out—this may help the hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire, North (Jim Sheridan) with his question about independence—that Ireland is at the opposite end of the table. It is in the very fortunate position of having the highest proportion of people moving from low-quality jobs into high-quality jobs. It is important that we recognise the failures in our society and accept that there are better ways of dealing with the problem. Ireland clearly has some ability to improve things that Scotland does not have. The next recommendation in the report is that we should be careful about forcing people into work. Recommendation 10 highlights the fact that the parents pushed into work could be entering low-paid work. They could go from low-paid job to low-paid job to low-paid job. Although work is of course an important route out of poverty, we must ensure that people do not leave socially valuable work. The report points out that much of the work that many people do in the home is not recognised. The work of carers and those who look after children is not fully recognised, and we should be careful about forcing people into work of low economic value. Recommendation 12 calls for more resources. The Child Poverty Action Group in Scotland welcomes the £1 billion extra from the Chancellor, but it points out that this is only a quarter of what is needed. If we consider that we are fighting £1 billion a year wars in Iraq and in Afghanistan, perhaps we should take another look at our priorities. Recommendation 15 is important, and offers a step that the Government can manage relatively easily. The hon. Member for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Sandra Osborne) picked up on this point, too. The equalisation of child benefit would remove the discrimination against larger families and would make sure that the state values all children the same. Child benefit should be £18.80 for all children, not £18.80 for the oldest child and £12.55 for subsequent children. As I said, I want to touch on fuel poverty and how it impacts on one in 10 children. The memorandum submitted by The Highland council to the Committee in October 2006 marked out the low wages in rural economies and, as the Member representing Na h-Eileanan an Iar, I particularly recognise the higher costs of rural living. The current Scottish Government are trying to help with transport costs on the islands in my constituency through the road equivalent tariff, and a pilot project extended this to Coll and Tiree. However, as Edinburgh gives with one hand, London takes away with the other: the price of diesel was £1.34 a litre only a couple of days ago, and it could be higher now. The proportion of tax paid on fuel is higher in my constituency than probably any other in the land. The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Carmichael) touched on an important point when he said that the cost of central heating oil was rocketing for his constituents. The position is the same for my constituents, and the percentage of household income spent on fuel oil and other fuels, and the distances that people have to travel, must mean that far more people are being plunged into poverty. As has been said, it is sometimes not worth while for people to take a job if they have to travel 20 or 30 miles in what may well be a poor third-hand car, and face the costs associated with that travel. Perhaps we could throw party arguments to one side and aim to get child well-being higher on the agenda; our position in the UNICEF table should be a lot higher. Interestingly, in ““The Health of Nations””, the authors point out a fact that surprised me. The Swedish Government face the most unequal income distribution pre-tax, but the most equal post-tax. As one of the contributors to the Committee’s report pointed out, before the first world war a commentator said that where a thinking rich man might see a problem of poverty, a thinking poor man might see a problem of wealth.