‘It's intolerable' The true horror of child poverty in modern Scotland

WE are killing childhood. That’s the terrible thought which lingers long after a conversation with Mary Glasgow.

She runs Children 1st – Scotland’s leading charity for young people, once known as the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.

And the major cruelty facing the children she and her team deal with today? Poverty.

Poverty, she says, is killing the very notion of childhood. Listen closely to what Glasgow says and a Hobbesian vision of childhood emerges for our most vulnerable youngsters, one that’s nasty, brutish and short.

The world we’ve created – from poverty to social media – means “we don’t let children be children for any real length of time. We aren’t protecting childhood, never mind children. This will absolutely come back to bite us”.

It’s a profound indictment of modern society from one of Scotland’s most influential charity leaders. The cruelties of the adult world now come crashing in on childhood far too soon, particular in the era of mass poverty.

Glasgow says she often doesn’t “know where to start” when asked to explain the multiple crises facing Scottish children today. “It’s so enormous. Families are just completely overwhelmed by how difficult things are, and there’s no respite.”

Mary Glasgow, CEO of Children 1st. Photograph by Colin Mearns

Children are constantly exposed to financial pressures facing their parents, while still dealing with the impact of lockdown which stole years from their childhoods.

“We see so many overwhelmed children,” she says. “When parents aren’t doing well, children aren’t doing well. And honestly, I’m overwhelmed by the enormous levels of poverty we see.”

Glasgow was a social worker for 30 years. “In the early 1990s, things were bad then through the 2000s it got a bit better. Since then it’s just steady decline for the circumstances children live in.”

The huge gap between rich and poor increases pressure on children, damaging their mental health. One in four Scottish children officially live in poverty. That’s “horrific”, says Glasgow, though she instinctively believes that statistic is an underestimation. Parents are struggling “to even keep children warm and fed, never mind the extras they need as well”.

Public servants – teachers, social workers, police – as well as charity workers who are all there to support children on the margins are themselves “overwhelmed” by the scale of social decline. One of Glasgow’s staff was on the verge of tears recently as he described a mother “surviving on toast” so her children could eat. “There are children who are having childhoods that are absolutely heartbreaking.”

Government

Scotland is wealthy, she says. But government isn’t “spending money in the right places,” she says, adding: “Stop overcomplicating things. The solutions are in our gift. I get furious about what’s happening. We must find a way out of this.”

Children 1st has “seen huge increases in the number of families where poverty is the main issue”. Once, Children 1st dealt mostly with child neglect. Today, it’s poverty.

“The majority of children we support now live in families where poverty is having a huge impact on their lives. They simply don’t have money to cover the basics.”

When Glasgow asks her 300 staff about the main issue they’re dealing with, “quick as that they say ‘poverty’. If I’d asked a few years ago, poverty wouldn’t have been first. We’re not a poverty charity. We’re about keeping children safe. Five years ago, the biggest issue would have been addiction or domestic abuse”.

She says: “Now our staff say ‘how can we even talk to parents about creating safe environments at home when they’re absolutely terrified about how they’re going to pay their bills or get food on the table’.

“People are carrying a level of anxiety that I don’t think we’ve seen before and it’s not getting any better.

“The first thing we must do to keep children safe is make sure they have enough to eat, homes are warm, they’ve coats and beds to sleep in – the basics. Poverty has become a massive issue and it’s having the most dreadful, catastrophic impact on children’s development, health and wellbeing.

“The stress for parents is unbearable. When we think of neglect now, we have to think about it in the context of poverty.

“When you add in domestic abuse, violence, addiction, bullying and online harm, life has become very tough for many children. That’s why we see such rising numbers of children struggling with mental health.”

Glasgow believes “there’s real risk we’re slipping back to a Victorian-style gap between rich and poor”.

She says: “The level of inequality between those who have enough and those who don’t will have devastating long-term consequences for Scotland if we don’t take urgent action to change things.

“We must make different choices about where we spend money and I can’t think of anything more important than the health, safety and wellbeing of our country’s children.”

Social media like Instagram means children are “bombarded with images of life that’s unobtainable”, increasing mental health problems. Rather than “Instagram lives”, children “are living in conditions where we worry about their safety and wellbeing”.

Glasgow adds: “What are we doing to protect childhood? Childhood should be a safe phase. That’s being taken away from many children far too quickly.”

Poverty is just getting “deeper”, she says, adding: “Previously, when we talked about children in poverty, we didn’t think of parents who worked coming to organisations like us for support”.

That’s changed.

Glasgow is deeply troubled by “the uncomfortable tolerance that’s growing” towards child poverty.

“People often deny children’s pain, they don’t want to look at it. There’s the temptation to turn away. That’s happening now in our country.

“Children face a daily war to survive. We can’t turn away from that.”

There’s a “Victorian judgment and unkindness” in society now towards poverty

Homeless

RECENTLY it emerged that almost 10,000 Scottish children are homeless and in temporary accommodation, like cheap B&Bs, sometimes for two years. “That’s horrific and damaging,” says Glasgow. “People are becoming immune to what that actually means for children. We won’t pay a short-term price for this, we’ll pay long-term for not protecting children.”

Glasgow says she understands why some people use emotive language like “Dickensian” to describe what’s happening. “We’ve children living in cold houses where there’s not enough food. Today, we have to make sure children have beds to sleep in, that they have school clothes and shoes to wear and that their most basic needs are met. But it’s 2024. Children are living in circumstances they haven’t created or have any control over. It’s cruelty.”

Glasgow is troubled by Scotland’s lack of social mobility. She was brought up in a working-class home in Edinburgh’s Wester Hailes in the 1970s, but like many forged a good life for herself through education, hard work and some luck.

Today’s children in low-income families are just as talented as children of her generation but “opportunity is off the table for many of them right now”.

There’s also a “Victorian judgment and unkindness” in society now towards poverty. Children and families “shouldn’t be stigmatised because they’re struggling to manage on meagre amounts of money”. When families have money “they spend it wisely in the best interests of their children, but judgment is laid upon people if they dare get a TV or a glass of wine.

“Children feel that shame. It’s not their shame, it should be ours. But they carry the burden of guilt about poverty. Again, that erodes the notion of a carefree childhood in which to grow and develop without the worries of the adult world. These worries start very young for too many children. We know more than ever about how precious early years are, we’ve neuroscience at our fingertips to prove it.”

Happy, safe childhoods make happy, healthy adults who contribute to society. “Yet at the same time, children are left to live in conditions that totally undermine that,” she says. “When you live in poverty, when the adults around you are under pressure, when teachers and social workers are exhausted, you learn the world isn’t predictable, safe, kind or interested in you.

“What do you think is going to happen when these children grow up? We’re going to create adults who didn’t have their needs met and may not know how to meet the needs of others.”

However, she caveats herself. Clearly, every child in poverty doesn’t grow up angry and antisocial. Most overcome poverty and become good members of society. But poverty increases the risks.

Many children are subjected to the “double whammy” of poverty and being told “be kind, be nice”.

Meanwhile, angry, divisive politicians are “creating polarisation in society”.

Expulsions often lead to children simply forced to remain in dangerous homes with neglectful parents, Glasgow warns

Gaslighting

GLASGOW says: “It’s gaslighting an entire generation. We’re saying ‘look what you could have won’. But the adults made such a bloody mess of it all. Kids are looking at adults and thinking ‘really, you’re telling us be kind? Do you listen to yourselves?’.”

Nevertheless, Glasgow says that children today are “more compassionate than ever”. That’s testament to Scotland’s beleaguered youth, she believes. “Despite everything, kids today are amazing – they’re an incredible generation.”

That may be down to children being more familiar with mental health problems than previous generations. Yet at the same time “investment in children’s mental health services is shrinking. Mental health is a ticking time bomb. The support just isn’t available”.

Covid and lockdown only worsened matters. “Children who had substantial parts of their lives disrupted are just expected to get on with it.”

She’s uncomfortable with the “rhetoric” around declining behaviour in schools and “the number of children who aren’t attending school”. Society is looking at these issues without the “context” of what the pandemic did to children.

Talk of school expulsions by the SNP Education Secretary Jenny Gilruth is “deeply disappointing, it’s responding to populist demands and will only make matters worse. These children need recognition of what they’ve been through, understanding and support. They don’t need demonised and pushed out of school. We’ve very short attention spans when it comes to recognising the impact of adversity on children”.

Expulsions often lead to children simply forced to remain in dangerous homes with neglectful parents, Glasgow warns.

She adds that her charity had pupil support workers in schools to help children struggling with behaviour, paid for with government money.

“It was incredibly fruitful but of course it was short-term and when money got tight that was the first thing cut.”

Additional support staff – who help with disruptive pupils – have also been cut.

Abuse

CHILDREN 1st had to step in to fix a gross failing of the justice system around children. “Children who have been subjected to abuse or violence were waiting two years before they got to court. Then they were cross-examined in ways really detrimental to their wellbeing, causing them trauma, and they got no help to recover from that.

“Children had to repeat what happened to them up to 14 times to different professionals in police stations, hospitals, social work departments, courts. Children were saying to us ‘the offence wasn’t as bad as all that’s happened to me at the hands of the system, and I wish I’d never told anybody’. Again, that’s robbing children of childhood.”

The charity begged the Scottish Government to act. “They’ve been talking about transformational change for decades … My job is to say ‘children can’t wait, childhood is finite’.”

Eventually, Children 1st raised money from the People’s Postcode Lottery and acted itself, setting up what’s called the Bairns’ Hoose, a safe, physical space for child victims where they can be interviewed by officials, alongside support workers. Edinburgh University and Victim Support Scotland also assisted.

The government gave Children 1st “a little grant, but mostly we did it with charity money”.

Now Children 1st has proved how effective just one Bairns’ Hoose is, the Scottish Government has decided to “roll it out”.

Says Glasgow: “We can’t do that nationally. That’s the government’s job. But they’re doing it too slowly, without adequate investment, and they’ve overcomplicated it.

“Everything is layered with so much bureaucracy. We’ve built up an ‘industry’ around children that’s really hard to change.”

The Scottish Government, she says, “knows that we’re critical of them. We certainly push, provoke and demand that government does much better”.

Glasgow adds: “I get really angry when I’m continually asked onto the same bloody government working groups, and nothing ever changes.

“This culture needs to shift radically towards action. There must be a sense of urgency.

“I feel frustrated when another request comes in for another consultation or joining another working group. I think ‘am I part of the problem by joining this, does it look like I agree with this process?’.

“As a campaigner, would I be better saying ‘I’m not joining another working group?’.

“It’s a hard balance because how does change come about? Do you stand outside throwing pelters or try to infiltrate and take the scales from people’s eyes and say ‘this is the reality children are living’.”

Glasgow previously worked for a UK-wide charity where colleagues would tell her “you’re so lucky in Scotland because your policy environment is much less hostile to children”.

However, in Scotland “the ideas and rhetoric around children are very good, but when it comes to real action and investment, that’s when it falls down”.

Politicians

RATHER than simply release funds to help families, the government “creates an industry around implementation – an industry of civil servants and working groups. You’re like ‘just give the money to the people who know what to do with it’. Stop creating this industry”.

Glasgow says there was “a £500 million commitment over the lifetime of the Parliament to go into community-based family support. We were delighted. But two years later, we find ourselves cutting and closing family support services as only a proportion has been released. I get really upset because what’s said isn’t what’s being delivered on the ground”.

She’s sick of politicians “fighting about who’s to blame” rather than working together to solve child poverty. “What comes first for them is the interest of their party or the government, when we’re in a crisis right now that we’ve never known before. It’s time this tribal nonsense was gone. This generation of children needs leaders to act right now”.

Glasgow doesn’t think the Scottish Government is “malevolent” when it comes to decision-making, however. The problem is “the way they implement policy”. There’s a “disjoined, siloed approach” with issues like poverty and homelessness treated separately. Only a “holistic approach” will work.

“Children have their lives sliced up by government departments. That needs to stop. It’s wasteful. Children aren’t cars where bits are fixed here and bits over there. But that’s the system we’ve built. It’s really bad in Scotland. Government has been talking about fixing it for years, but nothing changes.”

EMBARGOED TO 0001 TUESDAY APRIL 18 File photo dated 13/04/23 of First Minister Humza Yousaf, who has been urged to be bold on taxation by a group including anti-poverty campaigners ahead of a key statement to Parliament. The First Minister will lay out

Policies like “The Promise”, intended to improve the lives of care-experienced children, are “great” but the Scottish Government “failed to understand what it will take to deliver. This does nothing to address the absolutely intolerable conditions many Scottish kids are living in”. Politicians fail to even talk to the electorate about “why investing in children matters. That’s not a conversation they want to have”.

She adds: “We’re failing to recognise children’s needs, we’re failing to look after them the way we should.” She isn’t blaming parents. “It’s as a society, as governments, that we’re certainly not giving children the attention, care, love, and investment they require.”

Future

THE Scottish Child Payment “was really good. The government should be praised for that. But was it enough? No. It should be more.” For years, the Scottish Government has “missed targets” on child poverty. “If after 10 years your plan isn’t working and the trajectory is getting worse, then write a new plan, do something different. Quite simply, a decent childhood should be at the centre of everything government does.”

If Glasgow had a magic wand “lifting children out of poverty would be the single biggest thing what would change lives”.

She adds: “Children are going to school without breakfast. That’s so fundamental. It needs fixed first. There should be no child poverty in a country as wealthy as Scotland.” But then there’s “abuse, neglect, fractured relationships, drug and alcohol use, mental health, housing. One magic wand isn’t enough”.

Although Glasgow grew up in a tough housing scheme in the 1970s and her dad experienced unemployment, she’d never swap her childhood then for childhood now. What she’d like to see is children today experiencing the same childhood she had in the 1970s. “Isn’t that shocking to say? But my childhood had more possibilities than the childhoods I see children having now. That’s terrible, but true.”

In the 1970s, working-class kids had access to youth clubs, community groups, local libraries, swimming pools, sports clubs, local arts groups – opportunities to change their lives. “Today, that’s all mostly gone. These were routes out of poverty. Now, they’re non-existent,” she points out.

“The arts, sport, music – these are transformational but for many children they’re unobtainable luxuries. We’re talking today about how to give children the very basics. I want children to have so much more than that – all the opportunities there are for an abundant life. It’s just tragic what’s happened.”

Glasgow is about to start work on her charity’s next five-year plan. “I think about writing the last plan, five years ago, and how times were so different. We thought things were bad then. I remember writing back then that ‘things have never been tougher for children’.

“Five years on, and I don’t even know where to start. The very notion of how long childhood lasts is getting shorter and shorter before the adult world and its fears come crashing in.

“We’ve got to protect childhood. But government money is always diverted to other places, and it’s always the most vulnerable who end up paying the price: our children.”

To donate to Children 1st visit www.children1st.org.uk/crisis