Scotland

In this section you will find out about the PSE UK team's collaborations in Scotland. We have forged links with Poverty Alliance who act as the national anti-poverty network in Scotland and work with voluntary organisations, policy makers, people with direct experience of poverty and politicians at Scottish, UK and European levels. Here on the PSE website we provide a platform for community findings from the Evidence, Participation, Change (EPIC) project, in particular their work on poverty and stigma such as the Stick Your Labels campaign. PSE team members from The University of Glasgow are working with Poverty Alliance on joint projects and have also served on the research advisory board for EPIC.

We have also linked up with the Poverty Truth Commission to provide a wider platform for their work. The Poverty Truth Commission, based in Glasgow are running a ground-breaking Scottish wide project bring together people living in poverty with Scotland’s civic leaders and key decision makers to uncover the reality of poverty and explore collective solutions.

The situation in Scotland

32%
of adults in Scotland suffer from financial insecurity

One in three adults in Scotland suffers from at least one form of financial insecurity such as an inability to afford household insurance, £20 savings for a rainy day or a private or occupational pension.

Around one in 20 people in Scotland are unable to afford an adequate diet. The great majority of Scots think that all adults should be able to afford: 
two meals a day (92%), fresh fruit and vegetables daily (82%), meat/fish or vegetarian 
equivalent every other day (82%). 7% of adults lack at least one of these food items.

The great majority of Scots  think that all children should have: three 
meals a day (91%), fresh fruit and vegetables daily (93%), meat/fish or vegetarian equivalent 
every day (90%). 3% of Scottish families include children who lack at least one food item. In all of the Scottish households where children lack a basic food item, at least one 
adult reported that they skimped on their own food so that others could have enough.

7%
of adults cannot afford basic items of clothing

Despite these findings, in comparison with the UK as a whole, the picture of deprivation in Scotland is not quite as severe. For the UK as a whole, 33% of adults lack three or more of ‘necessities’ that the British public think are essential for a minimum standard of living. For Scotland, the figure is 29%.

Further work is needed to establish the reasons for this, but one factor is likely to be the higher cost of housing in England, particularly in London and the south east. Other factors may be the differential impact of the economic downturn since 2009 on different areas. Download the PSE press release on the first set of findings for Scotland.

The PSE team in Scotland will be providing further analysis of the findings in Scotland here on the PSE website over the coming months

If you are involved in a community research project and want to share your findings, please contact us.

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