The latest child poverty poster from YesScotland is an insult to every low income parent and child in Scotland.
The latest child poverty poster from Yes Scotland is an insult to every low income parent and child in Scotland, writes Peter Russell
The accompanying press release is clear about this image:
“a waist-down image of a little girl in scuffed and battered footwear, dirty ankle socks and a ragged skirt.”
So what is the problem, why is a middle-aged middle class Labour voter so livid about it? Here’s why.
First, it is an outright and foul insult to every low income parent and child in Scotland and the UK, through its depiction of them as dirty, scruffy and negligent.
I took up the issue with CPAG Scotland whose director, John Dickie, confirmed:
“As you will see from our own written and visual material we are always very careful to reflect the reality that parents go to extraordinary lengths to protect their children from the poverty they face, very often going without basics themselves in order to ensure their children don’t have to go without.”
I am still at a loss to understand why CPAG Scotland did not also take me up on the challenge that they should condemn this denigration of low income families (but that is on their conscience.)
But here is a second reason to be furious about the poster: the figure of 100,000 extra children in poverty by 2020. This is in direct contradiction to the Scottish government’s own White Paper which tells us that by the same date the increase will be by 50,000.
Any single child being forced into poverty is of course an outrage, and certainly 50,000 is too high, but the point here is that there is a discrepancy of 100 per cent between the Scottish government and Yes Scotland.
Why should anyone believe either figure, both of which are being used for partisan propaganda purposes?
In the poster, the small print says in advocating independence:
“There is only one guaranteed way to reverse the growing number of children living in poverty.”
This is a lie.
There are other ways; above all changes in government policy at a UK level, which would also benefit children in poverty in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. This may require a change of government, but is does not require independence.
And there is no ‘guarantee’ that independence will reverse the trend.
Anyone reading the poster would imagine that there is a comprehensive, fully-costed proposal for the alleviation of child poverty on the table. However, like the rest of the SNP White Paper, all we have is vague assertions on child poverty: no costings, no projections, no guarantees at all.
And in fact, we know from their actions that the SNP cannot be trusted on poverty and equality issues. For example, they recently voted down a proposal to require the Scottish government’s contractors and suppliers to pay the Living Wage; similarly, they voted down a proposal for an inquiry into wage inequality.
Most tellingly, we can take the SNP’s proposal for Scandinavian-style ‘transformational’ childcare provision as an example of how it approaches policies for children and families.
It has transpired since the publication of the proposals, in the White Paper, that there is no evidence for claims which are made. No modelling, no projections, no costings: and FoI requests for this information have been rejected as being ‘not in the public interest’ (which is a laugh in itself: how is the public interest not served by information which will help it make its mind up in the referendum?).
These examples all show that the Nationalists are only interested in child poverty as a propaganda tool, and as a stick with which to beat the UK.
There can be no greater contrast than with the UK Labour governments 1997-2010, which introduced the Minimum Wage and Working Families Tax credits as well as many other measures which reduced child poverty by nearly 1,000,000 across the UK including 100,000 in Scotland (these were described as “heroic” by the UK CPAG, and were surely just well appreciated by its Scottish arm.)
An incoming Labour government could do the same again, across the UK. What is needed is not a change of nationality for Scots, but a change of government and a change of policies.
The difference is clear: it is between those who see child poverty and will act to fight it, and those in Yes Scotland and the SNP who are concerned only as far as it suits their narrow partisan agenda.
The public should now know:
- They will use disgraceful images of people in poverty which suggest that low income families neglect their children, and allow them to go dirty and a scruffy, if they think it will win votes.
- If there is any doubt, Nationalists and their misguided supporters will choose the highest available figure to inflate their claims.
- They will make claims which are unsupported and they know they cannot support, and when asked to do so, they will claim it is not in the public’s interest to know about such things.
There are three conclusions which we can draw from this disgraceful episode.
The first is that YesScotland is desperate and will do anything, and say anything, to get a referendum vote.
The second is that the SNP Scottish government has only a skin-deep commitment to equality and to tackling child poverty.
And the third is that if there is a little girl with dirty legs, a frayed skirt and scuffed shoes, what she needs is a bath, some new clothes and some shoe polish.
A greater income for her parents, be they in work or unemployed, is what will help with these, while independence will not help in the slightest.
Peter Russell blogs at Planet Pedro!
116 Responses to “Why am I angry about Yes Scotland’s latest poster on child poverty? Let me show you”
Alec
A lot of commenters appear to have gone for instant outrage in response to Russell’s temerity in describing himself as middle-aged and middle-class without checking his bio:
That is, someone born to upper to low-skilled workclass parents post-45, and who reaped the benefits of the meritocratic education system to raise himself up materially and professionally. Perhaps he should have remained in straightened circumstances – or compelled his children to – as some posters would have had him.
As well as the portrayal as children in poverty (without a quantifiable definition of this term) as dirty and unhygienic – in direct contrast to my own observation and personal experience – and explicitly stated that the only way to change it is for independence (and that independence will only change it for the better), there’s the implication that it is a different situation elsewhere in the UK or Western Europe… which it isn’t, leading back to the misconceived belief that an independent Scotland somehow will buck the trend of post-industrial societies.
~alec
Alec
Really? Is there a source for that?
Apart from the 59 Scottish members at Westminster, including ones in Government.
~alecx
notme3
Can you tell us all how much child poverty has come down under this government? (clue, it is in hundreds of thousands)
Ken Bell
We share quite a bit in common, Peter. We were both born in the mid-1950s, we are both English and we have both made our homes in Scotland. It looks as if neither of us believes in doing much in the way of productive labour; you by coining it in as a local government wallah, me by spending a lifetime doing the minimum amount of bastard work possible in whatever job came along. You and I belong to the generation that could give a two fingered salute to any manager and tell him to take his complaints up with the union, secure in the knowledge that nothing would ever happen and that the maggot could be ignored.
Unlike you I had the good fortune to go to a Secondary Modern, so came under no pressure to provide employment for the teaching trade by staying on beyond 15. Also unlike you I will vote yes in September. It is a gamble, as you say, but it is one worth taking.
The thing I like about Scotland is the way in which working class issues are not ignored to the same extent that they are in England. As you know, council house sales have now been banned in this country, and even the Tories only made a token protest. I could go on and list all the other policies that benefit people of our class up here, but what’s the point? You know them already. I will just say that In England, disabled folk like me and local government place-servers like you are regarded as parasites by many people, but up here nobody seems to give a stuff.
With independence comes possibilities. To keep our collectivist system going I reckon that taxes will have to rise for the middle class, and that is just a good in itself as revenge for the past 30+ years. Working class people are pretty much the majority in Scotland, so forcing us to give those things up would be very difficult for a government. Thatcher and Blair could rely on the aspirational scrotes, but they don’t tend to exist here.
It may be that you don’t fancy the idea of Scotland as a concept, so don’t look at it in those terms. Think of it as being that part of North Britain which refused to accept the new Thatcherite-Blairite consensus and stayed true to the the British values that we both grew up with. Hell, my local chippie here in Leith still uses beef dripping to cook with -what more could you ask for?
Please have a think, and please at least consider voting yes in September.
jewel
All of us know how hard times are right now trying to pay for heating /food etc robbing Peter to pay Paul at the end of each month most if us try and prioritise and try to put our kids welfare first ie food although as we see more people using food banks it shows how hard things are.
So I get really angry when I here SNP harping on about child poverty in Scotland and how it would change under independence.
Why can they not prioritise like the rest of us?
Do we all really need free over the counter medications ie paracetamol etc?
Do we need more and more money thrown at Gaelic education & BBC Alba?
Trams?
Alex Salmond & co need to stop blaming south of the border for Scotland s child poverty and use our money to sort it rather than spending it to win votes .