More children in jobless households

THE number of children being brought up in Scottish households where no adults are working has increased. Under-16s living in homes without adults with paid jobs rose to 145,000 (15.8 per cent of all under-16s) this year from 141,000 (15.3 per cent) last year.

The worsening situation for young people is occurring despite Scotland experiencing a slight decrease in the number of workless households over the past twelve months, according to figures released on 1 September 2011 by the Office of National Statistics.

Peter Kelly, director of the Poverty Alliance in Scotland, told the media: "These figures tally with the experiences we have been picking up from the organisations that we are working with.  People are getting back into jobs, and that's undoubtedly a good thing. But the rate of decline of worklessness is not as quick as we would like.

He added: "This is a long-standing problem, which is not just caused by the recent recession, so it is going to take a long time to tackle."

Scotland's Poverty Truth Commission has argued that those at the sharp end of poverty need to be involved directly by policy-makers and politicians in arriving at fresh solutions and approaches to the problem.