When we first met as a Commission, we were clear we wanted to place lived experience at the heart of what we do. We all believed that incorporating the unique perspective from people living with poverty would make our work more informed, credible and influential. However, we also discussed how we weren’t sure that we knew the best ways of putting the insights and experience of people living with poverty at the heart of our work.
Blog
Welcome to the Poverty and Inequality Commission’s blog. On the blog we’ll share news and views from the Commission but we’ll also be inviting other organisations and individuals to blog about their experiences and the work that they’re doing to tackle poverty and inequality. Views expressed in blog posts don’t necessarily reflect the views of the Commission.
International Women’s Day
Written by Katie Schmuecker
This International Women’s Day there are women in Scotland who are caught in a rising tide of poverty, with their incomes restricted by patterns of work and the division of caring responsibilities – whether that’s for children, disabled or older people. This simply isn’t right in a society that prides itself on justice and compassion.
Hearing from people with lived experience of poverty
We have commissioned Poverty Alliance and the Scottish Poverty and Inequality Research Unit (SPIRU) to develop guidance for us on how we can involve people with direct lived experience of poverty in our work.
Read moreHearing from people with lived experience of poverty
Dignity and respect in public services
Here we report on work the previous Commission completed on what people with direct lived experience of poverty had to say about public services and being treated with dignity and respect.
Child Rights and Child Poverty
Written by Professor Morag Treanor with input from Juliet Harris of Together (Scottish Alliance for Children’s Rights)
Today is Universal Children’s Day and the 30th anniversary of the adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). The UNCRC is a charter comprising 42 articles that set out the human rights to which all children are entitled. It was ratified by every country in the world with the exception of the USA. Although ratified, the UNCRC in the UK was not incorporated into domestic law, which means that children’s rights in the UK have no legal power. The lack of incorporation of the UNCRC into UK or Scots law has meant that whilst courts have found some welfare policies to be in breach of children’s UNCRC rights there has been nothing that the court can do to provide remedy. For example, the ‘benefits cap’, introduced under the Welfare Reform Act 2012, was found to be in breach of the UNCRC in 2015 but the court had no power to provide any form of redress. In Scotland this may be about to change.
