Regional economic development, inclusive growth and child poverty in Scotland
Research on how local and regional economic development policies can contribute to reducing child poverty in Scotland.
You know, if I think back and reflect now, I don’t know that it is explicit to support child poverty. I think it’s much softer - around job creation, skills development, but it’s in a sort of softer way. It’s in a less directive way, I suppose. And I wonder … whether … there’s scope for making stronger links.
Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas
3.1 Introduction
One key objective of this report is to ascertain the extent to which there is a focus on child poverty in local and regional economic development work in Scotland. In this section, we draw on our content analyses and case studies to address seven issues. First, we review the extent to which City/Regional Deal documentation refers to Local Child Poverty Action Reports (3.2) and the extent to which LCPARs refer to City/Regional Deals (3.3). Turning to the interviews, we consider stakeholders’ views on the extent to which their work has a focus on child poverty (3.4), mechanisms for impacting change (3.5), regional strategic priorities and child poverty (3.6), local economic priorities beyond child poverty (3.7) and consideration of specific child poverty issues (3.8).
3.2 City/Regional Deals references in local child poverty action reports
Local authorities, in partnership with their local NHS health board, are now preparing the fourth iteration of their Local Child Poverty Action Report (LCPAR) - the local statements of actions completed and planned to tackle child poverty in their area. As outlined in Annex 1, we reviewed the second round of LCPARs, for which an almost full set was available across Scotland[1] and which provided a picture of local activity before Covid-19 conditions shaped immediate priorities. The aim was to gain insight into the extent to which LCPARs were connecting with City/Regional Deals.
Only one third of LCPARs referred to their local City/Regional Deal, with only brief mentions made to these Deals. The exceptions to this were in Ayrshire, in which each of the three LCPARs made more extensive references to the Ayrshire Growth Deal. Interestingly, none of the LCPARs in each of Scotland’s four major cities referred to their City Deal.
Cross-referencing the local City/Regional Deal is not the only recognition of a wider interest in economic development issues in LCPARs. Also significant was the extent to which LCPARs referred to ideas of an ‘inclusive economy’ (or inclusive growth), ‘community wealth building’ or the ‘living wage’.
The majority of LCPARs (71%) referred to the ‘living wage’, with a strong focus evident in South Lanarkshire, Renfrewshire, East Renfrewshire, and Dundee. One-third of LCPARs referred to ‘living wage’ but did not refer to wider notions of the inclusive economy, community wealth building, or the City/Regional Deals. An ‘inclusive economy’ was mentioned in one third of LCPARs (35%), with ‘community wealth building’ mentioned in fewer still (19% of LCPARs). Even here, many of these are fleeting references made in passing, rather than developed commitments to utilising these ways of developing the local economy to tackle child poverty. Ideas around CWB were only developed in the LCPARs of East and North Ayrshire. The inclusive economy was not particularly prevalent in many LCPARs, but received more attention in Clackmannanshire, the three Ayrshires, Dumfries and Galloway and Renfrewshire.
Six LCPARs - one-fifth of the total - made no reference to City/Regional Deals, CWB, inclusive economy, or the living wage. This included all three island authorities, the City of Edinburgh, Aberdeenshire, and North Lanarkshire - a diverse range of authority types. This is not to suggest that there is no dialogue on economy and child poverty agendas in these areas; however, it is interesting that child poverty action plans do not refer to these issues.
Several LCPARs specified actions in relation to the living wage, with others referring to this in context-setting for the action plan. Community wealth building, inclusive economy and Growth Deals were manly referred to in context-setting, although some authorities (Argyll and Bute, in addition to the Ayrshires) referred to the longer-term transformative potential of CWB approaches.
3.3 Child poverty in City / Regional Deal documentation
Complementing the review of LCPARs, we reviewed a wide range of City/Regional Deal documentation to assess the extent to which ‘child poverty’, (and related ideas of ‘deprivation’ and ‘inequality’) featured in the public presentation of this work. The sources reviewed for references to poverty and child poverty included various Deal documents, blogs, heads of terms documents, annual performance reports, community benefit strategies, meeting minutes, and investment plans. There was no shortage of references to poverty among these documents - poverty was mentioned more than 400 times; there were over 300 references to inequality, and 150 references to deprivation.
For the most part, references to poverty were used to justify the need for City/Regional Deals, and in some instances, to provide the focus for their actions. The narrative was that evidence of poverty, often presented as endemic and enduring, was the context that required the transformative approach to economic development that City/Regional Deals represented. This issue of poverty was particularly evident in the Edinburgh and Glasgow City Deals, although the problem was expressed in the documents of other REPs.
Poverty was also presented as an opportunity for economic development. This was articulated most clearly with reference to tackling fuel poverty and digital poverty, challenges faced in both urban and rural Scotland. Some Deals also had work programmes that closely aligned to what might be expected in a LCPAR. For example, the Edinburgh Region City Deal’s Intensive Family Support Programme (in Fife) is a work programme that aims to support parents into employment, tackling poverty through increasing income from employment.
3.4 Focus on child poverty: views of economic development stakeholders
As can be seen from the quotations extracted below, child poverty was understood to be a problem in each of the case study areas. For some, awareness was raised and sustained through the routine presentation of evidence (extract 1). Others expressed concern that current actions to tackle child poverty were inadequate (extract 2). There was also some acknowledgement that child poverty was intensifying (extracts 3-4) and that there was an imperative to act now (extract 4). It was recognised that the timeframe for measuring impact was a challenge for those working in economic development - which traditionally works to achieve positive outcomes in the longer-term, and that making impact in the short-term would require collaborations (extract 4).
1 [How much child poverty is there in your areas?] … A lot, I suppose is the short answer… some of the statistics that we look at regularly are around poverty and specifically, child poverty (Council lead, rural authority)
2 I don’t mean to be crude about it, but it doesn’t matter how many free school meals or school uniforms you… put out the door, you’re not gonna shift those figures [incidence of child poverty] that are now going to rise from the 30s [30%-39% of children] to the 40s to the 50s (Third sector lead, large city)
3 There are conversations that happen between all three partners to look at what interventions are in place just to make sure that we understand where the changing challenges are (Council lead, rural authority)
4 Where we’ve got more thinking to do… in my team, and through our funding [is to develop] a medium to longer-term lens. So, what we’re doing is… generally, transformation that will happen over the next few years and beyond. So, it’s [about] that longer-term perspective. What we’ve obviously got to [do] - [and] where it’s harder to tie into - is the here and now… How do you make sure that you’ve got things that are relevant [now] and can do things here and now, as well as some of the big, big picture changes… that come through at the end? Because, you know, by then we’ll have had too much child poverty and so, it is about the system working together. (Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
Given this recognition, it was no surprise that many different stakeholders asserted that there was a focus on tackling child poverty in their area (extracts 5-14). Some expressed a personal commitment to tackling child poverty (5-6), with others referred to local structures introduced to tackle it (7-11). On the other hand, a child poverty focus was not always explicit (12), with some acknowledging that tackling child poverty was outside existing remits (13) or beyond the horizons of what they regarded as relevant (14). In general, there was some focus on child poverty, although some interviews described their focus as tackling poverty in general (9,12).
5 For me, personally, it’s one of the main driving things. Just something, personally again, that I feel very strongly about. (Skills development, local officer outside large city)
6 You see palpably the deprivation, the challenges that people have and ultimately, that’s the difference I want to make. And I know I can make it personally, with the team, by bringing resilience to the economy… I’m not sitting there as a lone voice by any stretch. In fact, I’d say we all have that common view, but I suspect that’s because people understand the challenges in [the region] (Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
7 In [the authority], there has been a lot of work, you know, focusing on poverty. But particularly child poverty. (Third sector lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
8 We’ve actually got a child poverty plan coming to our leadership team meeting on Wednesday. So, we take that as a quite a cross-cutting theme. (Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
9 What the Community Planning Partnership has done is to set up a poverty and inequalities task group. (Council lead, rural authority)
10 [Child poverty] is something that probably is absorbed by the local statutory agencies, more than the third sector in [local authority area] … We do have a children and young people’s forum and within that, I know that child poverty is a concern. (Third sector lead, rural authority)
11 The first iteration of that benefits realisation plan recognises the issue surrounding child poverty in [the region]. It includes several impacts that can be linked to addressing this issue including the creation of jobs, fair work implementation, community wealth building, participant wellbeing uplifts, and the wider update of wellbeing and fair work. (City Deal lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
12 In [the region] - the focus at the moment… are fair work, land and assets, and procurement… We don’t tend to talk about poverty. It’s just it’s absolutely embedded into everything. (Third sector lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
13 We don’t have a remit for addressing child poverty. (Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
14 There is something about the whole subject of child poverty… that, you know, now that I think about it, there’s a bit of a resistance to it and even just [to] children. And it’s not … [deliberate], nobody’s saying ‘We don’t like children’… you know? Nobody’s saying anything like that. (Third sector lead, rural authority)
In each of the case study areas, there was some acknowledgement of a recent sharpening of focus on child poverty and related issues (extracts 15-19). For some, this shift was a heightened focus on child poverty within anti-poverty activity (15), while for others the shift was a re-appraisal of traditional local economic development work to consider its social impact (16-18). Not everyone reported such a shift in focus. However, the interview process alerted some stakeholders to the need for them to make connections to better understand how their work impacts on child poverty (19). Some argued that more change was needed, for example, to re-appraise traditional approaches to economic development in City Deals to address the challenges that emerged during the pandemic (20). Concern with social impact (16-18) tended not to be articulated in terms of impact on child poverty per se; rather, the concern it was described in terms of impact on communities (17,18) or reducing inequality (16).
15 They’ve [the local NHS health board] set up a subgroup on child poverty… it’s … a new thing really... We [local authority] have anti-poverty measures and some of those are directed towards children and some are directed more generally towards areas of poverty. (Council lead, rural authority)
16 The challenge… from when I took over as chair… is to understand how infrastructure translates into tackling inequality… If you build a bridge, what else is happening? … It’s a whopper… I’m not sure that there was always the clarity of how those were connected. (Council lead, large city)
17 The big, big focus in [the city] region [is] the infrastructure projects. But other City Region Deals became a bit more flexible… The focus has shifted because from 2014 to up to 2020, in the wider economic development, there was more focus on region, on resilience and local growth, particularly recently, [with] the emergence of community wealth building and that kind of stuff. (Small business lead, across authorities)
18 [Regeneration] is much more, I think, about understanding how the impact of economic growth hasn’t had its effect on communities that are not as well attached to the economic engine that the city region is. (Business lead, large city authority)
19 But you’re making me think that we probably ought to try and make links between [own children and young people’s forum] and the… Community Planning poverty and inequalities group. (Third sector lead, rural authority)
20 We thought at the beginning of pandemic that maybe we should refocus. You know, at least look at the project or City Region Deals as a whole and then think… Do we just carry on or not? So… we raised this at the national and local government level. But nobody listened to us, and everything just went [on] as if nothing happened… We felt [that was] quite strange because the pandemic changed a lot of things. But the City Region Deal just carried on as… if nothing happened (Small business lead, across authorities)
As extracts 5-14 illustrate, local work to tackle (child) poverty was acknowledged, as was a heightening of focus on the social impact of economic development work (extract 15-20). However, this should not be over-stated: there was also recognition that child poverty was, at best, marginal in many City and Regional Deals. This was the appraisal in each of the case study areas in relation to three different Deals (extracts 21-24 below). There was some support for a child poverty focus (24), even if this is not the core function of the Deals, and some reflection that the focus of the Deal would be different if it was being designed today (24). Interestingly, some concern was expressed by interviewees that even when there is a strong social purpose to a Deal, it may not necessarily follow that this will result on a focus, let alone an impact, on tackling child poverty (25).
21 The parameters of the Growth Deals are determined by the government. Therefore, it’s a Growth Deal and is controlled by economic growth so it’s not specifically, there’s no specific project… which is about child poverty. (Council lead, rural authority)
22 I would have to be honest and say, I don’t - I would not call it [child poverty] a headline issue. (Third sector lead, rural authority)
23 [Tackling child poverty] wasn’t… a direct goal in our Deal. (City Deal lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
24 … requirements that were put in place… to determine which projects went ahead… It was it was Treasury, Green Book [frameworks] ... GVA was the… overarching measure that was used… And… clearly that is not something that captures inclusive growth. It doesn’t capture impact on poverty and inequality… Were we to go back and do it again, some of the projects would be different… This is still public money and… I believe should be focused on public sector priorities. (Council lead, large city)
25 We’re very much on the inclusive growth agenda. That became quite the thing to focus on. We’re now focusing on community wealth building. They’re… not a million miles apart. However, my slight worry is… do we lose sight of it? … We have to deliver on inclusive growth at the moment, but do we pick up the child poverty issue? … I just wonder, as we start to change our focus … do we lose sight of… that absolute core issue of child poverty? (City Deal lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
3.5 Mechanisms for change
Proponents of economic-led regeneration have contended, both explicitly and implicitly, that wider benefits ‘trickle down’ from such investment. On the other hand, critics have questioned the extent to which the most disadvantaged benefit from regeneration, or indeed whether they benefit at all. An affirmation that capital investment should or could lead to wider social benefit was acknowledged by the council leads in both the urban and the rural areas (extracts 26,27). There was an assumption and an expectation that the most disadvantaged would access their share of the employment opportunities, economic growth, and benefits of place-making.
26 The City Region Deal… is… physical interventions in places… [to] improve the quality of those places… [and to simultaneously] create uses for places which were previously unused derelict land and at the same time, creating employment opportunities, economic opportunities and tackling inequality… life opportunities and life chances for… citizens as well. (Council lead, large city)
27 Because it’s about inclusive economic growth, it’s about job creation, place-making. You know, those sorts of things which would improve people’s standards of living and therefore... lift people out of poverty and lift families out of poverty. But it’s not a specific project or programme about child poverty because [Regional Deal] is about economic growth - that’s its purpose… We have to make [the] business cases for certain projects and some of them will create jobs and we hope they create jobs, that’s the purpose of it… [to] create wealth in the communities. (Council lead, rural authority)
A more nuanced position was more commonplace - that ‘trickle down’ would accrue (or was likely to accrue), given the keener ‘community’ outcomes focus that now prevails in economic development activity (extracts 28-34). This thinking was evident in all three case study areas, and was a view held by a wide range of stakeholders. There was belief that contemporary ‘big ideas’ would yield positive outcomes for reducing child poverty and tackling deprivation: it was asserted such benefits would result from community wealth building (28,29,33), inclusive growth (29,31) and promotion of the circular economy (32), or the resilient economy (33). That there is not an explicit focus on child poverty was not always perceived to be a weakness: in one instance, not having a child poverty focus was viewed a strength as it avoided distracting from the central focus on community wealth building (34).
28 The [project is] linked in our view to child poverty… and we have a specific community wealth building project in the deal. However, as I’ve alluded to all the [local authority area] Growth Deal projects will be expected to contribute to reducing deprivation and increasing income levels as well as delivering community benefits. (City Deal lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
29 Although addressing child poverty is not a direct goal of the Deal, it’s assumed that the Deal will indirectly contribute to reducing this… So, certainly, as I say, a direct reference doesn’t appear in the Deal document, although there will certainly be an assumption that the Deal will play a part in reducing child poverty through inclusive growth and community wealth building objectives. (City Deal lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
30 There’s very little talk about child poverty directly, but there’s lots of talk about some of the solutions … to poverty in a wider sense and in terms of things like… inclusion in the economy, and in particular things like community wealth building, which you would hope would… start to result in more wealth existing within communities and in particular within the communities in the city that we know are going to have the highest levels of child poverty. (Third sector lead, large city)
31 The issue of inclusive growth is… integral to the work that we do at partnership level. As I say, not just the city but also the city region level, because inclusive growth is one of the three pillars upon which the whole strategic structure stands and… inclusive growth is a significant issue not just for social issues, but also for economic issues and… of course… child poverty is perhaps the most immersive element. So, it’s not unfamiliar territory for us and we’re very keen to discuss it. (Business lead, large city authority)
32 It’s about prosperity and opportunity for people and in the [local authority area] project we’ve got a couple of big programmes… trying to get that circular economy that brings benefits back to individuals and children in particular. (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
33 … nor do I directly look to make investments, interventions that would specifically address child poverty. But implicitly, because of what we’re looking at about economic transformation and creating more jobs - creating more sustainable jobs - and more diversified business space, a more resilient economy… then, inevitably, you know, we work with colleagues, we work with partners, where that is their primary objective or they’re closer to it and what we have to do is mesh it together. (Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
34 I don’t see the child poverty bit or any other aspect of it, the outcomes that we’re looking to achieve as a burden, because it should just be standard that this is what we do… and everybody is focused on that. (Council lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
Not everyone interviewed regarded social benefits as an automatic outcome of economic development activity. There was some acknowledgement that work was required to realise the potential benefits (extract 35, and 33), and that some of the mechanisms that could be used to achieve this were being used more extensively elsewhere (36). Some concerns were expressed that the private sector was being under-valued and crowded out as a partner (37), was not being fully consulted (38), or that the tenor in messaging was anti-private sector (37-39). There was also uncertainty over whether some of the current strategies were generating positive outcomes on tackling child poverty (40).
35 How do you create new economic growth - significant economic growth? By transitioning into new market areas, creating new industrial growth sectors, that resonate with the area. But critically… whatever we do, we have to connect that to our local people - our local residents - address child poverty, and we’ve got, you know, significant aspects of that [here] sadly… How do we make all of that positive economic investment good for our citizens and how do we attract more people to the area? … It’s very much done with the place-making and… we link it in to that broader, inclusive, community wealth building agenda. (Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
36 I think… about half of contracts [with the City Deal are] with… local companies… which is good. And I think that we want to see the numbers to go up to, you know from 50 to 60 to 70 [per cent]. And then we also want to see that the more smaller businesses get the contracts… Manchester City Council spends nearly 70% of local procurement with local companies, which is really quite significant. (Small business lead, across authorities)
37 [We have] public contracts for a whole bunch of things. So, it’s gone beyond just, you know, supporting local communities where investments taking place to watch your green credentials… How are you matching this [sic] criteria? … It just feels like it’s getting a bit too much of the expectation on business… If I might put it like that, there’s a prejudice built into some of the discussions around community wealth building against private sector organisations, and I just think that might be cutting off one’s nose to spite one's face. (Business lead, large city authority)
38 There’s still the odd example of [no consultation] … For instance, COP 26 and a car free city centre zone was announced… There’s always… things that are … a surprise … with worrying language … around the implementation, [and]… the… general messaging. (Business lead, large city authority)
39 I worry that there’s a little bit more language kicking around in the political sphere about profit before people… tagging business as being essentially an unhelpful partner in delivering on collective aspirations… There’s a sense that somehow or other business isn’t living up to its responsibilities. I would counter that… Local entrepreneurial business has always had a strong moral commitment to the betterment of the city. (Business lead, large city authority)
40 We do a lot of work now around looking at procurement and getting the benefit to local businesses. Is that explicitly done to tackle child poverty? I mean, you’d like to think it… should have an implied benefit, but whether there’s an explicit relationship, I’m not sure. (Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
3.6 Regional strategic priorities and child poverty
Although there was recognition of the responsibility to contribute to local efforts to tackle child poverty (extracts 5-14), a more typical view was recognition that tackling child poverty was not the headline focus of their organisation, sector, or region (41-46). On the other hand, the priority issues that were identified are inextricably linked with poverty, with several highlighted in the Scottish Government’s driver diagram for tackling child poverty (e.g., transport - extracts 41 and 42), or in wider debates about tackling poverty and promoting social justice in Scotland, e.g., community focus (extract 43) and promoting social enterprise (44). There was a clear sense of shared purpose and agreed regional priorities among stakeholders (e.g., extracts 45, 46 for the wider city region of the case study city).
41 We’ve been meeting with local businesses and communities. And the three top of the agenda things that are coming up are housing, transport and … infrastructure (that includes the digital). (Council lead, rural authority)
42 Digital exclusion, community transport… Community capacity building within communities… employability… Those four have been the drivers of our work in addition to the core work that we do. (Third sector lead, rural authority)
43 I have to say the bulk of everything that we’ve talked with folks around here has been people and communities. (Social enterprise lead, rural authority)
44 Social enterprises are absolutely key… If Scottish Government want to achieve those ambitions of fair work, if they want to achieve those ambitions of a wellbeing economy, et cetera. social enterprise is a fantastic way to do that… You make the money, but the money gets ploughed back in to achieving the social and environmental aims of that enterprise, which is great. (Social enterprise lead, rural authority)
45 [The economic strategy for the region] is much more focused on what we call the three grand challenges… which are inclusive growth, productivity, and the climate emergency and how those are interconnected. (Council lead, large city)
46 If you look at the strategy for the city region’s economy… Productivity remains important. But even a lot of what we talked about in terms of productivity isn’t necessarily about huge capital investment… There are two other strands that I think [would] have been… regarded as being adjacent or secondary… one is around climate change… the other is about inclusion in the economy, and I think … that’s really critical. (Third sector lead, large city)
3.7 Local economic priorities beyond child poverty
In addition to general regional strategic priorities, stakeholders identified a wide range of specific challenges that impacted upon their area and in particular upon their disadvantaged populations (extracts 46-52). Once more, these specific issues are inextricably linked to poverty (and child poverty), although the challenges were not discussed with poverty as a frame of reference. Among the specific challenges identified were poor health (extract 46), mismatches in labour market geographies (47), the need for the development of micro-qualifications (48), tackling poor business start-up rates (49), the loss of a local Citizens Advice service (50), a lack of understanding of social enterprises (51) and a lack of understanding from within the Department for Work and Pensions of the realities local people encounter in accessing work (52).
46 If you’re looking at the statistics, you’d say that the health issue must surely be one of the most significant [challenges]… which [has] disproportionately high levels of ill health. I wonder also about… the challenges with caring responsibilities, both for children and for their family. And… some of that is about flexible working… Equally… in my mind is… that at least half of that ill health is mental health. (Business lead, large city authority)
47 What we’re starting to be really concerned about is the number of people that live in the communities in the [Region]. A lot of them don’t work in the same community they live in… A lot of them are on the lower end of the pay scale… We’ve got a massive shortage of people to work in hospitality and tourism already. In fact, to be fair, we’ve got a massive shortage of people to work in most sectors across the [Region] just now. (Council lead, rural authority)
48 There are options to do very short, sharp courses that can give people the skills they need to access opportunities… The narrative... is [that if] you want to change your career, you don’t need to go into that course for three years. You know, it can be a couple of months, and I think that’s the pitch that needs to go out (Business lead, large city authority)
49 At least try to address issues like increasing start-up or… improving their survival rate, particularly for the [Deal]. You know it’s been a long-standing issue. (Business lead, large city authority)
50 The biggest thing in [local authority area] is that, since the demise of the Citizen’s Advice Bureau. There’s never really been a choice [in where to access advice]. You know, it’s been that’s what you’ll get and that’s what’s on offer… It has a huge knock-on effect into numerous things… So, the worry is that… it is escalating to a scale that we’re not gonna be able to manage or deal with… We can talk about having a community wealth building strategy and… ‘This is how we’re gonna deliver things’. But ultimately if… the fundamentals aren’t in place then, we’re not gonna achieve anything or very little of what the ambitious strategy is setting. (Third sector lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
51 One of the other key things that we really recognised in [local authority area] is the need for [social enterprises], because we have some amazing social enterprises dotted about, absolutely amazing ones. Not everyone would know they were social enterprises or not everyone knows what a social enterprise is or realises what they do. (Social enterprise lead, rural authority)
52 The biggest issue for me is that DWP policy just cuts across all of that… You know, this new welfare to work strategy is to get 500,000 people into work before June… I’ve got a few issues with that, and I think it really crosscuts other work that’s being done around areas like child poverty, fair working practice and all that kind of stuff. The… risk of being sanctioned… just… decimates any work that you’re doing around child poverty… improving people’s health and all that kinda stuff or… addressing health inequalities. When you’re sanctioning a family… you’re taking away their benefit. But not just that - you’re taking away their housing benefit. You’re pushing people into homelessness… Try and tackle child poverty when you’re pushing people into poverty. It doesn’t make any sense at all… Even looking at it from an employer’s point of view … if you’ve got 200 applications and only five of them were from somebody who is actually qualified or suitable for the job. It’s a huge waste of your time. (Social enterprise official, large city)
In addition to the wide range of specific challenges that individual stakeholders identified (extracts 46-52) there was agreement among stakeholders of particular challenges in both the large city and the rural authority. In the large city, there was a strong desire to invest in, and learn from, social enterprise (53) and in the Foundational Economy - recognised as sectors that offer particular opportunities for women, (54-55).
53 As part of the… City Region economic strategy, they’ve identified that one of the challenges… in terms of employment is getting more women and particularly women from minority ethnic backgrounds… But then you’ve got the social enterprise sector where 65% of social enterprises are founded and led by women… So, you know, it is a conversation to have with us as a sector. In terms of why that is and how we’ve maintained that over the years and what … drives women into our sector. And that might give them some intelligence as to how they can keep them in other sectors. (Social enterprise official, large city)
54 [We are] focusing much more on what we’re calling the foundational economy… [a] bit [that] often gets forgotten about… So, things like hairdressing and personal [services]… which are big employers of women, but… which [are] also notoriously low paid. And so, focusing on improving in terms and conditions and… improving the quality of work available… and… career progression… We’ve done work on career progression in the care sector… We see the care sector is absolutely crucial… it is both an enabler and an employer (Council lead, large city)
55 We talk a lot about… high value jobs… but there’s a lot of… mid-level jobs which are significant opportunities for people. Similarly, the kind of watch term at the moment is the Foundation Economy. You know, that’s a lot of jobs. So, if we can find the way to make those jobs more productive then that’s another area of value, I think we were talking about… You know communities that are excluded that we need to engage - it’s these kind of career opportunities. (Business lead, large city authority)
The challenges that an ageing population presents in terms of delivering a workforce was a priority issue in the rural area (extracts 56-58). In the context of economic development, the challenge was regarded as labour shortage and skills shortage (58), rather than service delivery issues. Interestingly, there is a sense that the availability of (poorly paid) work is part of the problem, rather than the solution to child poverty in the area.
56 The issues which are problematic in [local authority area] … is poverty … also… combined with [low] population growth. (Council lead, rural authority)
57 Because of that depopulation issue and the demography of our region - it’s quite an ageing population - we really need to grow our own, support our own, retain our own, try to get people in. (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
58 [We need to be] really much more focused on attracting and retaining people because we’ve got a depopulation issue and also a democracy issue about enabling access to skills and training. We’ve probably got the highest level of unskilled people because they get these kind of low skill jobs out of school. (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
Also in the rural local authority, some attention was given to engaging young people directly in a manner that resonates with the priority given to drawing from lived experience on child poverty work in Scotland (extracts 59, 60). Focusing on young adult workers is interesting issue in relation to the ambition to significantly reduce levels of child poverty by 2030. This work is consistent with what the Act is working to achieve. However, tackling poverty among young adult workers is unlikely to make much immediate impact on child poverty statistics (impacting only on those households in which a young adult resides alongside a sibling aged under 18). On the other hand, it was recognised that action to tackle poverty among young adult workers requires foundations to be laid in education (60), and therefore some interviewees believed that it should be viewed as part of the child poverty agenda.
59 We’ve started… to get young people’s take on what matters for them in terms of development in the local economy… It’s quite place- and community- based rather than sector based around the economic drivers for the community, and that reflects our rural areas. (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
60 We’re really going to try [to] target young people, and see whether or not there’s a way that we can support younger people who don’t necessarily have the same burdens of life, cost, living et cetera… who are just at a very different point in life - could we target them and see if there’s a way to help them [develop social enterprises]? (Social enterprise lead, rural authority)
61 [Skills development] focus is… largely on [the] beginning of that transition from P7 to S1. But it’s just pretty obvious that the problems that poverty brings are pervasive… across a person’s life… So, we are an all-age service… So, all the things I said about young people apply to adults in poverty as well. (Skills development, local officer outside large city)
Policy addressing child poverty increasingly promotes a ‘no wrong door’ approach in which those supporting families are encouraged and empowered to go beyond traditional ‘departmental’ remits to assist families to access the full range of advice and support that they need. Although the merit of this was recognised, caution was urged by some of those responsible for supporting young people that the limits of professional competence and expertise should be acknowledged (extract 61).
62 They are told… their job is to go so far. It’s about employability ultimately. It’s not to get caught up necessarily in all the aspects of somebody’s life. But it would be naïve to think that all my staff don’t understand and indeed see the effects of poverty in the young people that they’re dealing with. The difficulty is when we pick them up… the youngest they would be is 11 or 12, some of the problems that poverty brings are already impacting on their lives. So, you’re trying to maybe unpick or unravel the wee bits that you can … social work are there and you’ve gotta respect they’re there and have a particular skill set to deal with some major issues. Our guys are incredibly well meaning. Some of them are very well trained… Some have come from a more social work background. But we’re paid, if you like, by Scottish Government to get those transitions made. So… a work coach - if a young person had addiction problems - they can’t ignore it, but they’d maybe signpost them to a person whose better placed to help. And if you didn’t make that clear to them, I do think some of them would - because they’re very well intentioned - would go down a rabbit hole … trying to deal with an issue that they’d ultimately be out of their depth on. (Skills development, local officer outside large city)
There were also words of caution around good intentions requiring robust action plans. Not everyone was convinced that action followed intention:
63 I think we’re still in that world where the strategy says one thing and decisions aren’t quite catching up. You’re not necessarily seeing as much urgency as sometimes as I would like. (Third sector lead, large city)
3.8 Consideration of specific ‘child poverty’ issues
Much of the attention of those concerned with regional economic development was focused on strategic priorities (section 3.6) and specific ‘economic development’ issues (section 3.7) that were understood to impact upon child poverty but for which tackling child poverty was not regarded as a primary outcome nor focus. However, other local priority actions and problems identified by those working in regional economic development do feature more directly and prominently in the work of those who concerned to meet the obligations of the Child Poverty (Scotland) Act 2017. These include remuneration (section 3.8.1), skills gaps (section 3.8.2), cost of living (section 3.8.3), transport (section 3.8.4) and childcare (section 3.8.5). Also significant was the extent to which Covid-19 was considered to have re-focused understanding (section 3.8.6).
3.8.1 Low wages
Low pay was a shared concern of stakeholders in all three case studies areas. However, the nature of the challenge was different in each area. It was acknowledged that low wages are a cause of poverty, challenging those who propose that work per se is a solution to poverty (extract 64). In the rural local authority, there was an understanding that the economic base lent itself to the perpetuation of a low pay economy (extract 65). The challenges which low pay present and the solutions proposed varied across stakeholders. Upskilling (extract 66) and increasing rates of pay (66-70), sometimes to attract the appropriate calibre of personnel (68) were proposed, although it was also acknowledged that some sectors struggled to match the rate of pay offered by others, and that this was exacerbating labour shortages (69). Although the structure of the local labour market was identified as the root cause of low pay both urban and rural areas, in the former this was attributed to long-term economic decline, which traditional approaches to economic development were poorly placed to address (70). Those working in urban regions recognized that the labour market was complex and there was an issue in the differences between those benefiting from higher paying economic sectors and others (71). Actions targeted at populations at risk was proposed as one solution (71).
64 The issues which are problematic in [local authority area] … is poverty because there are low wages. (Council lead, rural authority)
65 We also have across [region] but particularly in [local authority area], the lowest wage economy in Scotland and probably in the UK as well, and that reflects two things, the hospitality industry, which is prevalent, and the agricultural industry, which has tended to have… lower pay. (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
66 [It’s] about… fair pay and rewarding that work and upskilling people so that they can… take themselves out of poverty… it’s about helping people help themselves (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
67 It’s not a view you want to use often, but it is a fact, and you know that [low pay is] an issue that holds people back. It holds children back and it holds people’s wellbeing back, particularly [as] we’re hitting… a cost-of-living crisis. So… we’re one of the first councils to take on the Scottish living wage and you know… this is through different administrations in the council… there’s been quite a focus on being able to try … to do the right thing for local people. (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
68 One of the pieces of work that we aim to achieve as a network is that we want to go out and do a full review of salaries, terms and conditions and benefits… If you don’t pay lots of money you don’t always get the capability, harsh as it sounds, but it’s true. (Social enterprise lead, rural authority)
69 The discrepancy between third sector and public sector pay and terms and conditions is a huge issue. And it has a direct impact on our ability, collectively, to deliver social care hours… We also have the lowest wage. I don’t know if you’re aware of this, the ONS has got the weekly wages by local authority and [local authority area] is the lowest in Scotland. (Third sector lead, rural authority)
70 A weak labour market, poor employment, the jobs that we do have are in low income, low wage industries, and all through that four decades long generational cycle of poverty and traditional economic development approaches we’re never going to solve it. (Council lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
71 Understanding which type of jobs we need to be creating and attracting. So yes, high quality and… decently paid… the Scottish living wage at a minimum. But also thinking about their accessibility, for example, [for] women with families and… people with disabilities, people with long term illness… We actually sat down with [company] and got them to agree that a percentage of the jobs that they would be creating would be ring-fenced for people from who are who are currently marginalized within the city region economy. (Council lead, large city)
3.8.2 Skills gaps
According to classical economic theory, a skills gap and labour shortages should lead to increased remuneration. However, interviewees reported a low wage economy with low pay (extracts 64-71) and labour shortages (72-75) as characteristic of their local labour markets. These views were not universally shared, but they were significant concerns for those who expressed them. In the urban authority with rural pockets, the aspiration to attract more highly skilled (and highly paid) work was also a concern, given uncertainty whether those furthest removed from the labour market - and at most risk of poverty - were equipped to access these opportunities (extract 72). This concern was also noted in the large city (73), with labour shortages reported across several sectors (74, 76). Although the challenges being encountered were presented as atypical (74) and partly resulting from the pandemic (74), the solutions identified concerned adapting practices in schools and colleges; for example, promoting micro-qualifications (75) and re-focusing employment-related work in schools (76). Some caution was urged by those working with young people (77), who suggested that providing training opportunities does not necessarily lead to improved outcomes. The need for some young people to earn for their families - leading them to access familiar work rather than pursuing aspirational careers - must also be acknowledged (77).
72 One of the big projects we’re working on is around digital process manufacturing… a key growth area for us, and that will require increasingly sophisticated skills… We will start working with those that are capable... I suppose, my concern will be, does that create an even bigger gulf? It may act in two ways. One, it may create a bigger gulf because we’re getting increasingly more sophisticated… The alternative, though, is… [that] these skills are [acquirable] with support and training. Then… it takes down a barrier… We’ve got to be careful … that [it] doesn’t create a bigger gulf between those that we attract in [and the] core residents’ population where we’ve got some very deep-rooted child poverty issues. (Economic lead officer, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
73 [Residents’] disconnect from labour market was telling... a lot of city centre jobs are either considered to be too high-level skill or just not the right place for us to access. We’re not gonna solve child poverty… if their parents… perceive that the opportunities for children are… limited and that the chances of their actions as a family making any difference or quite slim. (Business lead, large city authority)
74 [We are] coming out with two-year pandemic destruction with one of the tightest labour markets that we’ve ever had. I’m just off a call with [company X]. I’m talking about the challenges they’re facing and accessing IT skills and some core engineering skills. Long conversations with [company Y] last week about their ability to get welders and the ability to find taxi drivers in the city is significantly problematic for the night-time economy. Just now, bus drivers and so on… I cannot recall any point in the last 30 years where we have had such a wide range of industries screaming for skills. (Business lead, large city authority)
75 I think one of the challenges we face therefore is the is the inflexibility of the skills and [the] labour interventions… focus on apprenticeships … and graduate outcomes… We need to be much more about the micro credential-based training interventions that will help folks shift into the labour market opportunities right now. (Business lead, large city authority)
76 We just simply cannot find staff. [Company] put out adverts to try and recruit 40 or so staff last year. Not one applicant… it’s not about demand any longer, it’s about supply barriers... I know Skills Development Scotland is asking what do we need to do to overcome some of those supply barriers? … We’re working on measures to try and tackle that. There’s a lot of discussion about interactions at school level. Perhaps it’s taking a little bit of time for the very senior levels I think to grasp… that this is a moment. This is one of your milestone moments for really changing the trajectory of your city. I’m not sure that the urgency has really penetrated that level yet, but it certainly is there amongst… the middle management levels within the organization. (Business lead, large city authority)
77 Young people living in poverty don’t have the same aspiration, maybe don’t have the role models round about them. So, these are the things that careers advisors are meant to try and kinda lift their heads a wee bit and get them to think a bit more about it. But you have to offset that against the reality, which is in the home, maybe they need to bring money in. So, they’ve not got the choice to just do whatever career they like the idea of. (Skills development, local officer outside large city)
3.8.3 Cost of living
Reducing the cost of living is one of the drivers identified for tackling child poverty in Scotland. Current cost of living issues were acknowledged to present problems for businesses and workers who must travel as part of their work (extract 78). Although there was a sense that cost of living pressures were caused and/or exacerbated by particular exigencies (78, 79), they were nevertheless impacting on everyday functions (78, 80), demonstrating the precarious livelihoods of many, and broadening the range of vulnerability (80). There was also an acknowledgement in the rural area of a particular cost-of-living stress that was not related to contemporary events - a mismatch between the availability of affordable housing and the geography of labour shortages (81).
78 We are seeing… the knock-on impacts of other environmental challenges just now. So, the increase in fuel prices is a huge one both in terms of domestic fuel and transport… [it] means that people working in health and social care, who are using their own cars to go out and provide that care, are actually not able to go to their work. Because at the moment… they go out and they do all their visits and then they claim their fuel costs back. But the rise in the fuel price is so extreme that people can’t actually afford put the fuel in their cars to go out and do their jobs. (Council lead, rural authority)
79 The increase in food prices as well, driven by a lot of supply chain issues and by Brexit as well as some of the challenges that Covid’s left us with, is a big problem as well. So, there’s a number of external factors that I think that are making it worse. (Council lead, rural authority)
80 We’re speaking to organisations that provide things like financial inclusion support, food banks, these sorts of organizations. What they are telling us… is they are they have never been so busy. And the people they are seeing … has broadened hugely… We cannot cope with… the current situation. (Third sector lead, large city)
81 We’ve got loads of void housing but it’s not where work is. So, this issue of having somewhere good to live, that’s affordable, being able to access jobs and travel to them… attract[ing] higher pay and skills… [it’s about] looking at those things as collective rather than trying to fix one or ‘tother. (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
3.8.4 Transport
Access to employment was identified as a barrier in all case study areas (extracts 82-86, although it was presented as a particularly acute problem in rural areas (83-86). In the urban areas, inadequate public transport was identified as the problem (82), while broader concerns over the whole transport infrastructure were noted for rural areas (83,84). There was also perceived to be a problem with initiatives designed to promote mobility - entitlement to free travel for young people - being less effective in rural areas where services do not exist (84). In the urban area with rural pockets, there was a concern with the ability of residents from rural parts of the authority to access the areas identified as potential sites of future economic development (85, 86).
82 I’m going to take it to a very, very basic level, which is when you’re looking to access opportunities… to actually get to a job, public transport [is] quite often a barrier (Business lead, large city authority)
83 We don’t have the infrastructure; we don’t have the connectivity. We’ve probably got buses we don’t need, and we don’t have ones we do need… young people who are already living in poverty… can access free transport - but the transport doesn’t exist (Council lead, rural authority)
84 Transport has been one of the major issues for [young people] … Entitlement card is as much use as the bus it [is] used to get on, to get to where you want to be. So… one of the things we’re looking at… is a different model for public transport… We’ve never cracked it, and I don’t think it’s been cracked yet - honestly don’t know how we’re going to achieve it. (Council lead, rural authority)
85 Take an area like the [rural locality] that is really kind of locked out… in terms of how they go about travelling into [neighbouring authority] or other parts of [region] because of public transport. We’ve built… a swimming pool in [town 1 in rural locality] near the train station. If you want to go to that swimming pool as a family from [neighbouring town] a family of four, it costs something like £16 return… and that’s a similar challenge… when you take employment (Council lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
86 If we pull off some of the investments down at [location], these are big, big challenges… I’ve argued this for a number of years… we argued that as part of the Transport Act that there should be powers to have municipally owned bus companies, similar to what they’ve got in Edinburgh with Lothian Buses. That’s obviously now been given as a power to local authorities. So, Labour groups… are all pushing for a municipally owned bus company across [Regional Transport Area] which could, I think, start to address some of those public transport issues that we’re highlighting. (Council lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
3.8.5 Childcare
Improving access to affordable transport and childcare are identified as two of the drivers that could reduce the cost of living and lead to families being better able to increase income from paid employment. In each of the case study areas, some of those involved in economic development immediately identified transport challenges in their area (extracts 82-86 above). In contrast, childcare was not initially highlighted as a barrier to employment. However, after probing, there was recognition that childcare provision had to improve (extract 87-90). Once more, a geographical mismatch between availability and need was identified in the rural authority (87, 88), with the role of the local state being proposed where there is market failure (88). There was a sense that this was a universal problem (89), and it was a challenge that was being recognised both by those responsible for strategic direction (89) and those concerned with the development of initiatives in-the-field (90).
87 There are issues with childcare and accessible, affordable childcare in lots of communities. We see it, even in [local authority area], and we see it in [town in neighbouring Area] - that it’s not where it needs to be. (Council lead, rural authority)
88 A higher proportion of our childcare is in the private sector… I know with Government changes around free childcare that that has influenced some Council’s decisions… We’ve expanded a bit where there’s been market failure and we’ve created that capacity, but we’ve always relied on private sector to do that, so I’m not aware that [a lack of childcare is] holding us back. But there are instances and certain places given the geography, where it is an issue in certain places. (Economic lead officer, rural authority)
89 I think absolutely. It [accessing affordable childcare is] an issue everywhere, isn’t it? (Council lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
90 We’ve asked all our projects to identify which constraints they will be addressing and childcare… was one of the ones that came up within our [Project]… in the [Region] Growth Deal. And they were going to be looking at you know, a childcare facility within their enterprise and innovation centre. (City Deal lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
3.8.6 Impact of Covid-19
Earlier it was noted that the focus on child poverty in economic development activity was perceived to be strengthening over time (extracts 15-19). There were mixed opinions on whether Covid-19 had highlighted any previously unseen conditions. Some representing the Third Sector considered that the light shone on social conditions only confirmed what was already known (extract 91), or that it necessitated a focusing of efforts on the most extreme circumstances (92). Others indicated that they become more aware of the scale of the problem of child poverty (93), or more aware of specific challenges that child poverty presents (93). Covid-19 was also considered to have highlighted what may be possible in the world of work in the future, with a sharper focus on what enables workers to participate (94) and a heightened awareness of local services (95).
91 We conducted a major piece of research in the first year of the pandemic. We did… 40 … in-depth interviews with different third sector organisations across the [Region]. It was about six months into the pandemic. It was to try and get a deep measure of… how the pandemic had impacted but also what the big issues were for the third sector. And surprise, surprise, there was… nothing that came out of that research that didn’t already exist. (Third sector lead, rural authority)
92 The pandemic has just left her [family worker] absolutely focused… on abuse and violence against children… it’s as if… the pandemic has just concentrated all of that into extreme situations… social workers… they’ve got to prioritise that. (Third sector lead, rural authority)
93 The pandemic has shown us… poverty… is there that we didn’t know about. [The pandemic] uncovered a can of worms… and demonstrated that the children that are living in the more disadvantaged communities and houses had a major issue with online and home-schooling… They didn’t necessarily have the devices that they could do their schooling on. Some of them had devices but their families couldn’t afford the data costs to allow them to access home-schooling in the same way. You know, there’s a lot of things I think that have come to light over the last couple of years. (Council lead, rural authority)
94 This is a moment for real change… because you’ve got employers having gone through two years of shock and adapting to that shock and [reassessing] all sorts of assumptions about how things needed to be done. [There is a] much greater need for employers to adapt in order to attract talent… So, they want to try and make sure that they’re investing in reward packages of training that will help them build up a new staff and help retain their staff… This is the moment to try new ideas with some employers about parts in the labour market [that] they might previously have thought were too difficult to handle (Business lead, large city authority)
95 As people… were forced to… work from home… in their communities more than they would normally… then they start to see… [that] business there that does that or there’s a social enterprise here that does this. (Social enterprise official, large city)
3.8.7 Focus on place
It was not surprising that stakeholders with a regional (or local) responsibility would be attuned to the challenges that presented in their area (extracts 96-100). It is important to note how this aligns with the strand of action in the Child Poverty (Scotland) Act 2017 that requires local action (and the production of annual LCPARs). This local intelligence identified the scale of the challenge in particular locales within the region (extract 96), instances of when national initiatives were ill-suited to their area (97, 98), even when these may be desirable more generally. In other instances, there was a recognition that there was a need to adapt and apply issues that worked elsewhere to ensure that the locality could accrue similar benefits (99), and that the scale of the problems required solutions that were multi-dimensional, strategic, and regional (100).
96 What we are seeing is increasing challenges in the more remote, dispersed, rural communities… [I] am really conscious a lot of these themes are… national not specific. But I do think you… see the themes augmented in the rural areas, the rural economies, the dispersed communities. You see more challenge there and that does relate right across the piece. Whether it’s access to healthy food, it’s access to transport, it's heating, it’s digital. You know, it’s all of those things… you’re putting it under a magnifying glass when you come out to the rural economies for sure. (Council lead, rural authority)
97 We’ve got lots of local communities that don’t have a supermarket. You know, the twenty-minute approach to communities, to neighbourhoods, is all well and good. But you know, a lot of folk in [local authority area] are twenty minutes from their nearest bus stop, never mind twenty minutes from their nearest affordable shop. (Council lead, rural authority)
98 For people that are working in some of the traditional industries… it might be agriculture… it’s difficult to provide flexible working because… you’re daylight based, and things have to be done at a certain time. The cows won’t wait to be milked. So, in a lot of the traditional industries [not being able to offer flexibility] is an additional problem (Council lead, rural authority)
99 I would imagine… they [larger areas with a more diverse economic base] don’t have the same challenges as us in terms of procurement… So, they’ve not got the same issues that we’ve got. (Council lead, largely urban local authority with rural areas)
100 I think one of the challenges in discussing regeneration is the extent to which we understand how individual communities interact with… the region, and that the interventions need to be pretty broad based. So, you’re not going to solve… regeneration issues simply by doing land reclamation... You’re gonna need something around attraction of investment and business activity. You’re going to need transport improvements. You’re going to need some interventions on… the skills and labour market measures… They all have to happen collectively together. And I think that’s one of the challenges for City Deal… it’s targeting … the right areas at the right scale and with the right degree of empowerment at the local level. Not straightforward. (Business lead, large city authority)
3.9 Conclusions
Things like the Poverty Action Plan and so on come to the community board as well and they’re joint between us and the NHS. I’m not quite sure whether that work is as quite well joined up as it should be
Council lead, rural authority.
This research has shown that there are examples of synergies between City/Regional Deals and LCPARs recognised in official documents and reports. However, child poverty is primarily referred to setting the context for or justification of City/Regional Deals, and LCPARs which draw strongly upon economic development in their plans are the exception rather than the rule. What is presented in official documents - and confirmed in discussions with those involved in regional economic development - is that there is a general awareness of the importance of tackling child poverty, even if it is not always prioritised in action or strategy. Reducing child poverty was largely regarded as an indirect effect of regeneration measures, with a tendency for stakeholders to believe that of the benefits economic development would ‘trickle down’ and reduce child poverty, if not automatically, then as a result of more focused interventions, such as through community wealth building or community benefit measures.
Nevertheless, it appears that awareness and prioritisation is increasing, and the function and form of regeneration measures was being re-examined in some areas to intentionally increase their social impact. There was also awareness of some of the important facilitating factors which increase household income and reduce costs, particularly transport and childcare - albeit to a lesser extent than the expressed concern with low pay, skills gaps and need for training provision. Although there was recognition of the role that business could and should play in tackling child poverty, there was also some concern over what were viewed as anti-business sentiments and a lack of understanding of what different sectors and types of enterprise might contribute.
[1] At the time of publishing this report, 31 LCPARs were available for Year 1 and 31 reports for Year 2, but only 26 for Year 3 and 2 for Year 4.
Contact
Email: Elizabeth.fraser@gov.scot
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