Children living in Nicola Sturgeon’s constituency are the poorest in the UK.
Govanhill West – part of the First Minister’s Glasgow Southside seat – has a child poverty rate of 69 per cent.
That’s the worst in both Scotland and the UK, an investigation by the Sunday Mail has found.
It’s followed by neighbouring Govanhill East on 58 per cent – the second worst Scots area.
Margo Uprichard, chief executive of Govanhill-based charity the Louise Project, which helps struggling families, said: “Poverty is endemic in Govanhill.
“Over the course of this year, people who are already in poverty are going to suffer greatly. We are not in the eye of the storm yet but it is coming.
“We have always had families in crisis in Govanhill but the poverty is going to get worse.”
Three other parts of Sturgeon’s constituency were in the 10 worst areas – Strathbungo in third, Pollokshaws East, fifth, and Pollokshaws West in 10th.
The investigation has also highlighted a massive gap in poverty rates. The lowest child poverty areas were Murrayfield in Edinburgh, and St Andrews, at one per cent each.
In Dean Village, Edinburgh, home to the First Minister’s official residence in Charlotte Square, only four per cent are below the poverty line.
The Sunday Mail worked with our in-house Reach PLC Data Unit to analyse figures from the Office for National Statistics, published for all areas of the UK.
It showed 175,009 kids in Scotland were below the breadline in March last year, up from 158,781 in March 2015 – or one in seven in Scotland.
Other poverty-hit areas were Dalmarnock, Scotstoun and Carnwadric in Glasgow, Ladywell in Motherwell and Aberdeen East.
Sixty-one per cent – 107,507 – of kids living in poverty last year in Scotland had at least one working parent. Scottish Labour spokesperson for social justice and security,
Pam Duncan-Glancy, said: “What a damning indictment of the SNP’s record on child poverty this is. After 15 years in government, child poverty is still rising – even in the FM’s own constituency.”
Scottish Lib Dem leader Alex Cole-Hamilton said: “Politicians are supposed to stand up for the area that elected them.
“On the basis of these figures, the First Minister’s constituents have reason to be doubly aggrieved. They are being failed by their local representative and by the leader of the country.
“It is scandalous that, after 15 years of SNP governance, the number of people in poverty is on the rise.”
Charities have warned child poverty is likely to worsen with soaring food and energy costs and the axing of the £20 increase in Universal Credit last October.
John Dickie, director of the Child Poverty Action Group, said: “It is worrying that many of the children affected have full-time working parents. This shows many jobs are failing to pay a living wage.”
The Poverty Alliance, which represents 350 groups across Scotland, said the figures were a shameful injustice. Director Peter Kelly, added: “No child should have their life chances restricted and restrained simply because of where they were born.”
Imran Hussain, head of policy and campaigns at Action for Children, said: “Unless the Government chooses to shield them now by protecting benefits from rising inflation, it will fail on its manifesto pledge to cut child poverty and millions of families will continue to face years of miserable hardship.”
Mary Glasgow, chief executive of the charity Children 1st, said: “It has become almost impossible for many families to make ends meet.”
In February we revealed how thousands of children were also made homeless in the pandemic. At one stage, 7900 were living in temporary accommodation.
Glasgow Southside has been represented by Sturgeon since its creation in 2011.
A UK Government spokesman said it is supporting families. He added: “This includes putting an average of £1000 more per year into the pockets of working families via changes to Universal Credit, cutting fuel duty and helping households with their energy bills through our £9.1billion Energy Bills Rebate.”
A Scottish Government spokesman said: “Tackling child poverty is our national mission and we are helping to lift thousands of children out of poverty in Scotland within our limited powers.”
He added its Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan “is backed by new investment of £113million on top of funding already allocated”.
The figures are estimates based on the number of children living in families whose income is less than 60 per cent of the average income as of March 31, 2021, from the Department for Work and Pensions and population figures for mid-2020 from the ONS.
Victor's story
A dad of two from Govanhill has told how he is battling to keep his family’s heads above water as prices rise.
Victor Surmij, 29, has lived in the area for 10 years after moving from his native Slovakia.
He and partner Diana Dimeterova, 24, have seen their weekly food bill rise from £62 to £90 in just a few months.
Victor also fears he won’t be able to afford his power bill with recent price rises and is cutting back on his use of gas and electricity.
He runs his own bakery business in East Kilbride and is able to provide family, including sons Michael, four, and Victor, two, with fresh bread and other bakery items which helps him save cash on groceries.
But he fears for many others living in Govanhill on low incomes who are finding it hard to feed their children.
Victor said: “I know of parents who can’t afford to give their children simple things like chocolate as a treat.
“There is no doubt things will get worse for people here as prices go up. There is a lot of poverty and unemployment in Govanhill and they struggle to put food on the table.” Another local resident, Livia Rat, 38, who has three children, aged 18, six and one, says it is a daily struggle to feed her family.
Livia, who moved to Scotland from Romania three years ago, said: “I do not work and my husband has a job with a car valet. The price of food and heating is going up all the time.
“We just manage to get by but worry that things could get worse.”
