Response to Scottish Government’s Call for Evidence for the Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2026 – 2031
North Ayrshire Council · 18 March 2025
Back to Cabinet — 18 March 2025 and its agenda
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NORTH AYRSHIRE COUNCIL 18 March 2025 Cabinet Title: Response to Scottish Government’s Call for Evidence for the Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2026 – 2031 Purpose: To seek approval for the North Ayrshire Council response to the Scottish Government’s Call for Evidence. Recommendation: That Cabinet: a) Approves the response to this Call for Evidence, and agrees that the response can be submitted to the Scottish Government 1. Executive Summary 1.1 This report presents the North Ayrshire Council response to the Scottish Government’s Call for Evidence which will inform development of the next Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2026 - 2031. The full response has been attached as Appendix 1. This is a policy area that is a key priority for NAC. 1.2 The response has been developed using a collaborative approach amongst internal teams and external partners. The response summarises all feedback received for issue to the Scottish Government. It has been shared with and endorsed by the CPP. 2. Background 2.1 The Child Poverty and Cost of Living Board (CPCOL) was established in June 2022 to reduce child poverty and support residents through the cost-of-living crisis. The governance arrangements were recently reviewed, and the programme of work was transferred to the Community Planning Partnership Senior Officers Group in recognition of the fact that addressing child poverty and cost of living is a partnership endeavour. 2.2 Various interventions to reduce child poverty have already been implemented throughout North Ayrshire, and last year NAC was successful in its bid to become a Fairer Futures Partnership (FFP) with the Scottish Government. FFPs are partnerships between local authorities and the Scottish Government, set up to support families living in poverty. The partnerships aim to reduce child poverty through public sector reform approaches, and test and adopt locally determined approaches based on local needs and assets.
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2.3 In November 2024 the Child Poverty Strategy Team (CPST) was appointed using this funding, comprising of a Strategy and Programme Manager, Project Manager and Policy and Performance Officer. The team will be responsible for delivering the objectives of the FFP, the CPP and progressing NAC’s strategic priority of transitioning to a wellbeing economy. More recently, North Ayrshire was confirmed as part of the Collaboration for Health Equity in Scotland (CHES) national programme to consider ways to strengthen and accelerate the action underway to improve Scotland's health, increase wellbeing and reduce health inequalities with the launch event taking place on 25th February 2025 at Saltcoats Town Hall. 2.4 The Scottish Government published a Call for Evidence on 25th February. This sought feedback from stakeholders to inform development of the next Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2026 – 2031. The Call for Evidence sought views on how well current policies and actions are working and what new ideas or approaches might help to achieve significant reductions in child poverty in Scotland. The feedback provided will inform the development of the new delivery plan. This is a policy area that is a key priority for NAC, and the deadline to submit responses is Friday 28th March 2.5 Key strategic themes being tested by the Scottish Government include: • Increasing earned incomes by supporting and providing opportunities for parents and carers, to enter, sustain and progress in work. This includes through the likes of employability support and the provision of essential infrastructure such as childcare and transport. • Reducing the costs of living and maximising incomes from social security to allow families to live dignified lives and meet their basic needs. This includes through the likes of social security, affordable homes, and advice services. • Delivering holistic and whole family support to improve outcomes and wellbeing and enable families to better engage with other services that directly increase their incomes. This includes through action focused on preventing families falling into poverty and wider community-based support. • Supporting children and young people to reach their full potential and to break the cycle of poverty in the longer term. This includes through the likes of early years support, education, and post-school transitions 2.6 It is important to develop a response that benefits from the input of - and is endorsed by - our partners including the CPP. In order to ensure all relevant parties had an opportunity to provide a response, the request was put into a survey format and issued to key stakeholders. Stakeholders included teams in Connected Communities, Education, Customer Services, Employability, North Ayrshire Health and Social Care Partnership, NHS Ayrshire & Arran, and the Third Sector Interface, with the latter recognising the key role of the community and voluntary sector in responding to the poverty challenge. 2.7 Drawing on an iterative process, this draft was then presented to the CPP in workshop format on 10th March for further reflection and comment. This has helped to ensure that we have incorporated a wide array of perspectives and opinions. A proposed final version of the response is attached at Appendix 1. Key messages include: • Develop robust communication channels with lived experience to ensure participation in the design of services and transparency in reporting impact.
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• Invest in infrastructure and resources to support effective data sharing across partners to enhance the effectiveness of the holistic approach that the Child Poverty Delivery Plan proposes • Support local authorities to develop a single point of contact for families to access support and information • Move towards longer-term, unrestricted funding models to enable strategic planning and service sustainability • Invest in adult access to education, training and upskilling • Develop targeted interventions to address the specific challenges faced by families in rural and island communities 2.8 Note that we have previously provided input to the Social Justice and Social Security Committee’s Post-legislative scrutiny of the Child Poverty (Scotland) Act 2017. Although this is on a common theme, it is a separate piece of work which is led by the Scottish Government rather than the SJSS Committee. 3. Proposals 3.1 It is proposed that the Cabinet: a) Approves the consolidated response to the Scottish Government’s Call for Evidence for the Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2026 – 2031 and agrees that the response can be submitted to the Scottish Government. 4. Implications/Socio-economic Duty Financial 4.1 There are no financial implications for North Ayrshire Council contained within the current report. Human Resources 4.2 There are no HR implications for North Ayrshire Council contained within the current report. Legal 4.3 There are no legal implications for North Ayrshire Council contained within the current report. Equality/Socio-economic 4.4 Reducing child poverty sits at the heart of our equalities and socio-economic duty and there are implications related to our response. Climate Change and Carbon
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4.5 There are no climate change and carbon implications for North Ayrshire Council contained within the current report. Key Priorities 4.6 Child Poverty sits within our Wellbeing priority, but the proposals relate to the Council Plan in its entirety. Community Wealth Building 4.7 There are no direct Community Wealth Building implications for North Ayrshire Council contained with the current report, although we know that there are strong links between CWB and child poverty more broadly. 5. Consultation 5.1 As per section 2.2, the Council consulted with a range of internal and external stakeholders to collate this response. Stakeholders included the CPP, NHS Ayrshire & Arran, the Third Sector Interface and internal teams. Sam Anson Executive Director (Education) For further information please contact Jenni Blair, Project Manager (Child Poverty), on jenniblair@north-ayrshire.gov.uk. Background Papers Appendix 1: Consolidated response to the Scottish Government’s Call for Evidence for the Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2026 - 2031
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Appendix 1: Draft response to the Scottish Government’s Call for Evidence for the Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2026 – 2031 CPP-endorsed North Ayrshire Council Response to the Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 3 Consultation Introduction North Ayrshire Council (NAC) welcomes the opportunity to contribute to the Scottish Government's consultation on the Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 3 (TCPDP3). Our response is informed by a two-stage engagement process involving key stakeholders across the council, partner organisations, and our Community Planning Partnership Board. This process has enabled us to gather a comprehensive range of perspectives on the key themes and priorities for addressing child poverty in North Ayrshire. 1a) Do you think these are the right themes to focus on? NAC agrees with the four key strategic themes proposed in the consultation document: 1. Increasing earned incomes by supporting parents and carers to enter, sustain, and progress in work. 2. Reducing the costs of living and maximising incomes from social security to allow families to live dignified lives and meet their basic needs. 3. Delivering holistic and whole family support to improve outcomes and wellbeing and enable families to better engage with other services that directly increase their incomes. 4. Supporting children and young people to reach their full potential and to break the cycle of poverty in the longer term. 2a) What is working well and what actions should Scottish Government and partners either continue to do or to do more of? Our response is informed by a two-stage engagement process involving key stakeholders across the council, partner organisations, and our Community Planning Partnership Board. When asked what is currently working well, colleagues and partners celebrated partnership working as one of their most powerful tools in identifying, reducing and preventing poverty. This includes partnerships between directorates, third sector organisations, lived- experience groups, schools, and other key community organisations. We believe that effective partnership working is crucial to delivering integrated and holistic support to families. This must include partnerships with lived experience and communities to ensure that services are responsive to local needs. Funding streams that
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support holistic support and collaborative working, such as the Fairer Futures Partnerships, are a welcome enabler for this pan-organisational approach. 2b) Are there policies, actions or approaches that the Scottish Government and/or partners should either stop or do differently? The challenges of 12-month funding periods hinder recruitment, long-term planning, effective evaluation and service delivery. Move towards longer-term, unrestricted funding models to enable strategic planning and service sustainability 2c) Are there new policies, actions or approaches that Scottish Government should consider implementing? The role of adult education, training, and upskilling is invaluable in reducing and preventing child poverty through improved employment, professional progression opportunities and bolstering autonomy and aspiration. Investment in this area would be just one example of long-term poverty prevention and reduction. Specific challenges in rural and island communities are drivers of child poverty, particularly around transport and childcare, and must be addressed to ensure equitable access to services and opportunities. Work alongside these communities to understand and target appropriate interventions. 2d) How can Scottish Government and partners work differently to ensure seamless, integrated supported for families? What prevents this? Strategic, long-term planning should be grounded in robust data and evidence. This requires enabling data sharing and collaboration across partners. Investing in infrastructure and resources to support effective data sharing across partners could play a key role in enabling the holistic approach that the Child Poverty Delivery Plan proposes. A single point of contact to access support would improve accessibility for communities and enable better coordination of services. Supporting local authorities to develop this single point of contact for families could also aid in streamlining data for enhancing evidence-led intervention planning. 3) What more can we do to understand the challenges being faced by the family at greatest risk of poverty, including the six priority families identified to ensure their specific and interconnected needs are met? Effective partnership working is crucial to delivering integrated and holistic support to families, and this must include partnerships with lived experience and communities to ensure that services are responsive to local needs. Communicating the impact of child
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poverty interventions to the public in a clear and accessible way is also an essential component of building trust. Scottish Government and partners should prioritise the development of robust communication channels with communities and those with lived experience to ensure participation in the design of services and transparency in reporting impact. 5) Please use this text box to enter anything else you feel is relevant that we may have missed, this may include any research, evaluation or findings from consultations that you have undertaken which are relevant to this call for evidence North Ayrshire Council proposes that the language used to discuss child poverty can significantly impact our approach to addressing it. The term "tackling child poverty" can be challenging to define and evidence as we work towards the First Ministers recently communicated ambition of eradication. We propose adopting the framework developed by SPIRU at Glasgow Caledonian University, which offers a more nuanced and specific vocabulary for categorising child poverty initiatives: • Mitigation: Reduces the impact of poverty without necessarily lifting people out of it. • Reduction: Lifts people out of poverty. • Prevention: Lays the foundation for people to remove themselves from poverty or stops people from falling into poverty. • Awareness: Improves our understanding of poverty. Adopting this framework could support local authorities and partners to: • More accurately categorise and differentiate between different types of child poverty interventions. • Ensure a balanced approach that addresses both the immediate needs of families experiencing poverty and the systemic causes of poverty. • Develop more targeted and effective evaluation strategies based on the specific goals of each intervention. We recommend that the Scottish Government, in partnership with partners and communities, develop a language charter around child poverty. This charter could provide a common framework for discussing and addressing child poverty, leading to more effective and coordinated action.