The FM’s top aim is to tackle poverty. Here’s a progress report

Joseph Rowntree was an English Quaker philanthropist and business owner. The foundation he established has this week generated a report into UK destitution.

In case the word is unfamiliar to some, the foundation helpfully offers a definition. This is not about being a bit skint at the end of the week. It is not about skipping a cinema trip.

It is where people are fundamentally unable to meet basic needs – to stay warm, dry, clean and nourished. Where families, including desperate children, are in penury.

This week’s report logs a “shameful increase” in destitution across the UK as a whole, with the highest level in London. Some 3.8m people, including more than one million children.

But it praises the more generous welfare provision offered by the Scottish Government. As a result, Scotland experienced “by far the lowest” rise in the statistics.

So is it hooray for Holyrood? Is there bunting outside Bute House? Scarcely – and for good reason.

For one thing, Scotland has not reduced destitution. Merely recorded the lowest increase. As the foundation notes, “there is no cause for celebration when destitution numbers aren’t falling.”

For another, this week’s report, while commending Scottish efforts, challenges MSPs to go much further, citing the forthcoming Scottish Budget. Which enhances the dilemma already facing Humza Yousaf’s Cabinet, most notably his deputy Shona Robison who is compiling plans for presentation to Parliament in December.

The UK Government said the best way to tackle poverty was to drive down inflation and grow the economy, backed by such measures as an increase in the National Living Wage.

For the Scottish Government, Shirley-Anne Somerville said £3bn had been allocated this year to address poverty, including the Scottish Child Payment which draws particular praise in the Rowntree Report.

Again, though, it is not enough. Remember those basic needs. Most commonly, the destitute lack food. Beyond that, they miss out on sufficient warmth, followed by clothes and toiletries.

Remember too the other report this week indicating that the top three constituencies suffering from the highest heating bills are all in Scotland, in the Highlands and Islands.

So what is to be done? Scottish Labour has offered a package involving increased funding, a right to food and a child poverty commission.

However, such aims would fall to Holyrood to implement. And, in the shorter term, UK Labour is stressing its iron-clad determination to contain public spending and tax in the light of the post-pandemic economic crisis.

Both the SNP and Labour excoriate Conservative UK austerity. The Tories say 1.7m fewer citizens are in absolute poverty than in 2010, noting their programme to get people into work.

But what about that dilemma facing Shona Robison right now, with regard to the budget? As I suggested last week, the cost of living crisis – and public anxiety – may well trigger constraint with regard to income tax as well as council tax.

Scottish ministers say their ground-breaking Child Payment helps 316,000 youngsters and that they have devoted £83.7m of their limited budget to mitigating UK welfare cuts.

Scan more widely. There was a deliberately moderate response to the Rowntree Report from the SNP, a suggestion that its findings proved the relative effectiveness of their party’s policy in power.

But still not enough, as Scottish Government insiders concede. Going further, as Rowntree suggests, would mean finding the cash for much higher spending, which would lack any form of UK-funded support.

Scan more widely. Look at the inquiry currently being conducted by Holyrood’s Social Justice and Social Security Committee into child poverty and parental employment.

Entirely understandably, the committee’s inquiry is predicated upon the presumption that wage earning is a key antidote to poverty. It cites the Scottish Government view that “work offers a sustainable route out of poverty for many families and has a strong role to play in a balanced approach to tackling poverty”.

Look too at a Scottish Government marketing campaign, launched this week, urging young people and care leavers to take up the offer of Job Start support – that is, cash to ease the path into work.

Two factors appear evident. Again understandably, Scottish ministers posit the proposal that economic growth and thus more and better jobs can help counter deprivation; that they are, indeed, perhaps the sole stable basis for relief in the medium to longer term.

But what about right now? What about the destitute in society? Yes, it would appear that distinctive and divergent welfare support is making a difference.

And we should welcome and enhance the efforts of charities and other organisations to provide succour.

Some will say it is a disgrace that such support is required. While noting that, I would say that charitable provision has the edge on starvation. But, more broadly, it would appear that there are sharp fiscal limits to the scope of our efforts to relieve poverty.

Look at a consultation on the new Scottish pension age winter fuel allowance, due to replace the existing UK system from winter 2024/25.

It is emphasised that no-one will lose out. That there are no plans to change the basic payment. That there will be no means test or taxation involved.

Yet there also appears to be little prospect of going much beyond the current scheme, although, separately, support triggered by temperature has been made more flexible.

The Scottish Government notes that efforts to balance the budget mean “challenging decisions will need to be made regarding any new policy suggestions”.

Again, that is entirely understandable. There are many competing demands upon the Scottish purse. Each repeated endlessly during Holyrood questions. Which may limit the capacity to address those Rowntree challenges. For now.

In the SNP leadership campaign, both Humza Yousaf and Kate Forbes cited “eradicating poverty” as their top aim. The eventual winner, Mr Yousaf, noted, accurately, that inequalities in education or health could be tracked back to their core. In poverty.

That challenge persists.