Life in low income families in Scotland: a review of the literature

Child poverty is at the heart of the UK and Scottish Governments’ agenda (Bradshaw 2001; Department of Health 1999). In 1999, Prime Minister Blair announced that it was to be the UK government’s mission to eradicate child poverty by 2020, to half it by 2010 and to reduce it by one quarter by 2004. The political context of a contemporary Scotland (in which responsibility for some poverty-related matters are devolved), the subtlety of variation in political priorities that results (such as the greater emphasis on social inclusion in Scotland – Scottish Executive 1999; The Scottish Parliament Information Centre 2000), and quantitative and qualitative differences in how poverty is experienced in Scotland (Brown et al. 2002), necessitate a Scottish-level analysis of poverty. Nevertheless, it should be acknowledged that responsibility for most of the economic factors which would tackle child poverty are reserved at Westminster.