Aberlour ‘Deeply Disappointed’ At Lack of Election Vision to Tackle Child Poverty

Scotland’s biggest children’s charity Aberlour has expressed its deep disappointment at the lack of any meaningful vision or plan, during the election campaign, from any Party to tackle the scourge of child poverty that affects 1 in 4 children in Scotland and 1 in 3 across the rest of the UK.

Aberlour’s intervention comes on the day that their young people’s hustings will take place at Glasgow Science Centre.

The hustings will see representatives from all main political parties grilled by young people on topics such as child poverty, housing and education.

The event was initially hoped to be a leadership hustings but no party leader agreed to take part.

Aberlour CEO SallyAnn Kelly said:

“Child poverty and the consequences from it, which limit and deny opportunities to the children affected, is a national crisis. Yet, during this election campaign it seems that the scale of the crisis has not been appreciated by all the main political parties. 

1 in 4 children in Scotland are growing up in poverty. Across the rest of the UK that figure is nearly 1 in 3. Yet, watching this general election campaign unfold you wouldn’t know we had a child poverty crisis. It has barely registered as an issue worth discussing by the main political parties. This has deeply disappointed us at Aberlour.

Our young people will today ask questions of politicians. We hope that they will offer more than what has been proposed in this election so far.

Too many young people are suffering because of government inaction and they just can’t wait any more, they need policies, they need action and they need investment.”