Tag: A Just Capital

Edinburgh challenged to end poverty within the next decade

The City of Edinburgh Council Leader Adam McVey has pledged that eradicating poverty will stay at the heart of the Council’s future actions and policies.

This follows the publication of the Edinburgh Poverty Commission’s final report, A Just Capital: Actions to End Poverty in Edinburgh, which was published yesterday.

The report identifies seven key areas of action to end poverty in Edinburgh by the end of this decade, including Edinburgh becoming a living wage city, tackling the housing crisis and closing the educational attainment gap.

It marks the end of the work of the Edinburgh Poverty Commission as it hands over to End Poverty Edinburgh – a new independent group of residents with first-hand experience of living on a low income and civic allies drawn from business, public services and the third sector.

As a group, they will work to raise awareness and understanding of poverty, influence decisions, and hold the city to account for ending poverty in Edinburgh.

Adam McVey, Council Leader, said: “On behalf of the Council, I would like to extend my thanks to those in the Edinburgh Poverty Commission and End Poverty Edinburgh for the time, dedication and research that has gone into creating this report.

“I’m also extremely grateful to those who shared their personal experiences and those of their families in helping get to the root of the issues. Tackling poverty in our city is one of our key priorities as a Council – helping those who need it, making resources available for people and, ultimately, doing everything we can to eradicate it in Edinburgh.

“We know that the pandemic has been incredibly challenging for those who were experiencing or at risk of poverty in our city.

“The Commission has pulled no punches and got to the heart of the issues – while there is no doubt that the pandemic has exacerbated the situation, poverty in Edinburgh is a crisis that goes beyond one cause and we cannot ignore it.

“If we’re to make progress on the scale required, it needs a concentrated effort from us, our partners and allied organisations, local business and residents acting as one Team Edinburgh.

“The seven areas of action give our City clear and defined areas for us to focus on and we appreciate that they are interlinked and support each other.

“Our 2050 Edinburgh City Vision is of a fair city where all residents share in its success and have a good level of wellbeing and life experience and we have been working with the Commission throughout our continued response to the pandemic to make that vision a reality, ensuring that as we rebuild our city we do it with our most vulnerable in mind.

“The educational attainment gap is a big priority for us and has been for a long while now. We were making good progress in this area before the pandemic but we’re mindful that the disruption to the school term earlier this year has widened that gap. Now we need to work with our schools and educational partners to double down on that work and ensure the progress continues to be made.

“We also know that access to and cost of housing is a central issue in Edinburgh and needs a focused and strategic approach in collaboration with the Scottish Government to deliver the new homes needed to make significant impact.

“We’ve already made progress around short term lets and will be ready to act quickly when regulations come into effect. We’re proud that Council houses being built right now are some of the best homes being built in the City but there is still work to be done to make sure we can provide good quality and affordable homes for everyone in our city who need them.

“The Edinburgh Poverty Commission has spent over two years listening to the voices of the people of Edinburgh and the reality faced by many of our residents, with COVID making it harder than ever for too many. 

“That’s why the Council and the city has to come together to tackle both the cause and consequences of poverty. It will take time and won’t be easy, but we will ensure it remains at the heart of our policies as we drive the change needed across the Capital in partnership.”

While over 200 people attended the online launch of the report, local mum Ashey was picking her children up from school.

She had just left her youngest at her Nan’s as it was raining and the bairn has a cold. Nan had also given Ashley £5 to tide her over until partner gets paid on Friday. He has two cleaning jobs but he expects to be paid off at any time as one big office contract has just been terminated and the other is also looking vulnerable.

Ashley will just have time to pick up the kids, go to Farmfoods, collect the bairn then make the tea for her partner getting home, as he has to be back out for his evening cleaning job.

Tomorrow … well, we will face that tomorrow.

Surviving, not living. There are families just like Ashley’s all over Edinburgh, one of the richest cities in the world.

Edinburgh Poverty Commission set out a ten year ‘horizon’ for eradicating poverty in the capital. For all the ‘horizons’ and the council’s ‘visions’, you wonder where Ashley and her family will be in ten years time, when for now just gettting by, getting through from one day to the next is the ever-present challenge.

A Just Capital? Edinburgh Poverty Commission launches final report

Today, the Edinburgh Poverty Commission launches it’s final report, A Just Capital: Actions to End Poverty in Edinburgh.

In this blog, EPC Chair Dr Jim McCormick (below) sets out the Commission’s journey, what we have learned along the way, and what we are calling for next:

Our Call to Action in Edinburgh comes after almost two years of conversations across the city: with people experiencing poverty, the community anchors that support them, keyworkers, employers, councillors, public service officials, housing providers and taxi drivers.

This rich process has uncovered new insights on how poverty is experienced in Scotland’s capital city – some arising directly from the COVID-19 pandemic – but more stemming from long-established struggles. We set out much of what we had learned about the immediate impact of Covid in our interim report in May.

Since then, we have maintained a clear focus on addressing the root causes of poverty as well as mitigating the consequences. We have discovered common ground among people with different experiences and in different sectors: that poverty in Edinburgh is real, damaging and costly – but also that, despite the powerful currents that threaten to drive us further off course, there is enough determination in the city to embrace the twin challenges of solving poverty and reducing carbon emissions over the next decade.

We have identified six broad areas for action and one cultural challenge that should serve as a lens through which each action should be approached.

Our first proposition is that Edinburgh will only succeed in creating a prosperous city without poverty if it creates the conditions for good jobs, genuinely affordable housing, income security and meaningful opportunities that drive justice and boost prospects – above all, in the city’s schools.

In addition, a much sharper focus on connections across the city is needed – via digital participation, cheaper transport and creating neighbourhoods that work. These actions combined will flow through to reduced harm to people’s physical and mental health. Emergency food support should not become locked in as a fourth emergency service but serve as a gateway to other support that will ease isolation and build human connection and kindness where it has been lacking.

The common challenge running through all of our work is a cultural one. We call on the City Council and its partners in all sectors to shift towards a relationship-based way of working which gets alongside people and communities in a holistic way.

The experience of poverty is too often one of stigma, being assessed, referred and passed from pillar to post – a separate service and multiple workers for each need. This radical move would see public servants authorised to put poverty prevention at the heart of their day-to-day work.

It will mean new relationships with citizens, employees and third sector partners. It will take visible leadership and longer-term financial commitment. There are green shoots in Edinburgh and examples from beyond Scotland demonstrating how better outcomes for families can be achieved and fewer resources locked into multiple complex systems.

We call this ‘the right support in the places we live and work’ to signal the importance of local access to multiple forms of support under one roof and within walking or pram-pushing distance – for example money advice and family support offered in nurseries, schools, GP surgeries and libraries.

None of these challenges are new. The City Council and its partners can point to significant investment in recent years to turn the tide on poverty. But we are not persuaded that actions have been consistent, at scale, sustained over time or have poverty reduction as part of their purpose.

While Edinburgh has many of the powers to go further, we are not persuaded that it can deliver on the required social housing expansion without a new funding deal with the Scottish Government.

This is urgently needed to boost investment and to help unlock the supply of land at a reasonable price. Almost one in three families in Edinburgh in poverty are pulled below the water line solely due to their housing costs.

That compares with one in eight households in poverty across Scotland. Solving the city’s housing crisis will go a long way to delivering on affordable housing ambitions for the country as a whole.

At the same time, the UK Government has a critical role in creating an income lifeline for families in and out of work, by maintaining the currently temporary increase in Universal Credit and Local Housing Allowance – both of which have become more significant as a result of damage to Edinburgh’s job market since March. 

This Call to Action is not a list of recommendations or a menu of options. Reflecting our lives, each area is connected to the others. A plan for housing makes little sense in isolation from a plan for schools. Developing skills for employment will fall short if basic needs for secure, decent housing and food are neglected.

Nor is the ten-year horizon a get-out clause. We have worked on this basis because Scotland has committed to a significant cut in child poverty by 2030 and because many of the city’s existing plans run to the same schedule. We call on the City Council and the wider Edinburgh Partnership to set out its initial response by Christmas, as part of a first year of planning and early implementation.

And we are leaving a legacy through a new independent network, End Poverty Edinburgh. Led by Commission member Zoe Ferguson and our partners at Poverty Alliance, this brings together a core group of residents with first-hand experience of living on a low income and allies who want to be part of shaping the solutions.

Inspired by a similar approach in Edmonton (Alberta), they will stress test this report, challenge and add their own ideas, work with city partners to achieve progress but also hold the city to account on its response.

I want to thank everyone who contributed to our work in the hard graft of sharing painful stories, completing surveys and through organised and chance conversations.

Each member of the Commission gave their time, energy and ideas generously and for longer than originally asked. The quotes in this report reflect only a little of their brilliant contributions. Our work – and this report – was only possible due to the skill, care and patience brought by our secretariat team of Chris Adams, Nicola Elliott, Ciaran McDonald, and Gareth Dixon.

We have listened, been shocked and inspired – I hope we have done justice to what we have learned. Our Call to Action sets out something beyond hope: it is an expectation of what the city can and must now achieve.

Dr Jim McCormick, Chair of Edinburgh Poverty Commission

Read the final report here and the supplementary data and evidence paper here.