Poverty: Glasgow North East

Dawn Butler Excerpts

Tuesday 6th May 2025 Westminster Hall

[Maureen Burke (Glasgow North East) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered poverty in Glasgow North East constituency.

It is a privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Butler. I am grateful for the opportunity to raise this most serious of subjects. I rise to speak not only as a Member of Parliament for Glasgow North East, but as someone who knows what poverty looks like up close. I grew up in Easterhouse, one of the most deprived areas of Glasgow. I left school at the age of 15 when both my parents were diagnosed with tuberculosis. I joined my siblings to help provide for our family, doing what we had to do to survive, like so many in our communities still do today. It is that experience that drives me now, recognising that behind every stat about poverty, there are people—families, children and friends—facing impossible choices. Fighting for them is the sole reason I am an MP.

The idea for this debate was born a number of months ago, when I discovered data from Health Equals, which revealed that my constituency of Glasgow North East has the lowest life expectancy of any UK parliamentary constituency. The truth is that although those figures are shocking, they are sadly not surprising. In Glasgow North East, wages are lower, and the percentage of people with a disability is higher, than the Scottish and UK averages. Deaths from preventable health conditions such as coronary heart disease are higher than compared with Scotland as a whole. Tragically, nearly 38% of children in my constituency live in poverty.

As Health Equals tells us, deep inequality between the poorest and the richest cuts lives short. In the UK, one of the richest countries in the world, people are dying because they are poor. When we think about poverty, we need to think of it in context. Glasgow North East having the UK’s lowest life expectancy does not happen by accident, and can be changed only through progressive Government action. For too many years, people in my constituency have operated under a system that has allowed inequality to fester. Opportunities and wealth have been unevenly distributed, and public services have failed people time and again.

The last Labour Government made the eradication of poverty a national mission. Families the length and breadth of the UK felt the benefit of that determination, but after a decade of Tory austerity and nearly two decades of SNP neglect in Scotland, that progress has been reversed and the living conditions of far too many are reminiscent of days we thought had been consigned to history. The Britain that this Labour Government inherited was broken. It was a Britain whose leadership had tolerated the intolerable as more people slid into destitution. That cannot be fixed overnight, but it cannot be allowed to continue either.

The Trussell Trust tells us that 3.1 million food parcels were handed out across the UK between 2023 and 2024—262,000 in Scotland and 5,846 in Glasgow North East. Sadly, tonight 10,000 children in Scotland will go to sleep in temporary accommodation—a number that has risen every single year in the past decade, bar a slight decrease during the pandemic—and one in six Scots will continue their agonising wait for NHS treatment. This is a wealthy country, but its people are poor.

The real lived experiences of people should always be at the centre of debates such as this one, because I believe that they make the most powerful case for change. In the Stobhill area of my constituency, there is a Marie Curie hospice. I am in absolute awe of the work done by Marie Curie to treat people in the final stages of their life with compassion and dignity. However, the staff working at the hospice will openly say that far too many of the people who come through their doors should have more time to live. That is not a hopeful attempt to comfort grieving families, although I am sure it does that too. Rather, it is a reflection of the direct effects that poverty has on people’s living standards.

Funded by UK Research and Innovation, Marie Curie and the University of Glasgow conducted a research project that was titled, “Dying in the Margins”. This research showed that one in four working-age people with a terminal illness in Scotland dies in poverty. That challenges the idea that terminal illness is an equaliser of social classes, recognising instead that it actually worsens inequality.

In addition, there is a 24-year gap in healthy life expectancy between the most deprived communities and the least deprived communities. When faced with a diagnosis of a terminal illness, poorer people are forced into making difficult choices or find themselves suffering hardship because of the associated costs. It is, as one participant in the research noted, a “double burden”.

Let us take, for example, Max. He is a 65-year-old gentleman who really wanted to spend his last days in his community and—importantly—with his dog, Lily. On one occasion, despite being in serious pain, Max even fled the hospice to be reunited with Lily, but his home was unsuitable for someone in his condition. He lived in a fourth-floor flat and could not climb into his bath. Sadly, the housing association failed to carry out adaptations to his home and so, in the final days of his life, Max was forced back into the hospice. He died, with his wish of dying in the comfort of his own home and with his beloved companion Lily by his side unrealised. We cannot change Max’s experience, but we can take action to ensure that we treat people who are in similar situations with greater respect and dignity.

Poverty can strike at any point, suddenly disrupting lives. That is what happened to my constituent Martin. He was a working homeowner who, because of a relationship breakdown, found himself homeless with three children, one of whom has additional support needs. Martin had to leave his job to care for his children during this traumatic period. Glasgow city council placed the family in a hotel, where Martin and his three children had to pack up and move rooms each night. Although Martin tried to keep his children in a routine and in school during this time, their school attendance suffered and their situation has obviously affected their education.

Martin remains in temporary accommodation that is unsuitable for his family. He has been trying to find permanent accommodation since November, but the social housing stock is just not available. Martin wants to work and provide for his family, but he is not receiving the housing support he needs to get him to that point. In short, poverty has put his family’s lives on hold. That is why, when I think of poverty, I think of it as theft. It steals potential and robs opportunity. It denies the world of the brilliance, warmth and talent of so many who may never be seen or heard.

Our duty, surely, is to do all we can to make better the lives of people we may never know or ever meet. I am encouraged by the work already being undertaken by the Government to do just that. The Government are legislating to ensure that work can be a genuine route out of poverty, as well as the realisation of a stable and enjoyable life. Our Employment Rights Bill delivers fairer working conditions, stronger rights and improved pay for millions. These are the steps that show our values: that work should offer dignity and security, not trap people in in-work poverty.

More recently, the “Pathways to Work” paper outlines additional steps through reforms to the welfare system. I welcome, for example, the scrapping of the work capability assessment, which many charities described as dehumanising and distressing. I also welcome the commitment to reduce assessments for people with longer term health conditions.

It would be remiss of me, however, not to acknowledge concerns about other aspects of the proposals, and I hope to hear answers from the Minister today. Can the Government ensure that people receiving end-of-life care will not lose access to their benefits as a result of the plans? Can the Minister set out how new employment support programmes will be delivered in a way that is supportive and empowering, rather than patronising and disparaging? Can the Minister confirm that the Government recognise that for some people work simply is not possible, and that they should continue to receive financial support and assistance?

I ask those questions because I recognise that our welfare system is failing people. I support the efforts to fix it, but reform cannot mean regression. Let us also remember that so much of the responsibility for welfare provision lies with the Scottish Government. They hold powers, so they must bear responsibility. My constituents are waiting too long for support, with the majority of adult disability payment applications taking four months to process. In 2023, shockingly, 116 people died while waiting for the outcome of their application. I will hold the UK Government to account, but I expect the Scottish Government to do more than posture on this issue, which I am afraid has been the extent of their contribution so far.

When my time as an MP ends, I want to be judged on the following questions. Did I make life better for the people in my community who had the least? Was I part of a Government who worked tirelessly to root out the causes of poverty and low life expectancy? Are people living better lives now than they were under the previous Government? We can be the Parliament that ends the era of excuses, and we can be the country that declares poverty not inevitable but unacceptable.

[Dawn Butler (in the Chair)]

I would like to get to the Front Benchers by 7.08 pm, so everybody has about three and a half to four minutes.

--- Later in debate ---

[Patricia Ferguson (Glasgow West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Butler. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East (Maureen Burke) on securing this important debate and on being such a doughty champion for her constituents.

Poverty is experienced by many communities across Glasgow, as we have heard, and my constituency of Glasgow West is no exception. In 2022-23, 19.3% of all people in Glasgow were income-deprived, compared with 12.1% in Scotland across the board. In Glasgow in 2023, 41.1% of secondary pupils were registered for free school meals. The figure for Scotland is just 13.2%. The Drumchapel/Anniesland ward in my constituency has the greatest depth of poverty in Glasgow. That is a lot of statistics, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East says, there is a family or an individual behind every single one.

Earlier this year, I held a child poverty taskforce event. The submission from that has been fed into the Government’s taskforce. It was attended by many organisations that work with children and families in Glasgow West. The stories they told and the evidence they offered were truly shocking. One participant, a volunteer with a youth club, reflected on her experience of taking a group of children on a day out and giving each child £5 to buy lunch. One child asked if he could forgo lunch and give the money to his mum so that she could buy bread and milk for the family. As you will gather, I find that story horrific, but that is the reality for many children who are all too aware of the financial pressures that their parents are facing. In effect, it takes away their ability to enjoy their childhood and be children.

As we have heard, since 2013-14 the funding received by Glasgow city council has reduced significantly, putting severe pressure on services across the city. Hopefully, the record settlement that this Government has passed to the Scottish Government will allow them to address what is now chronic underfunding. Over recent years, I have been disappointed that the SNP administration in Glasgow has not seemed to feel it either necessary or required that it should challenge its colleagues in the Scottish Government at Holyrood about that funding situation, because it should not have been allowed to continue.

We have heard a lot about the mortality rate in Glasgow. I will not rehearse that; I will just say that we have known for a very long time that health inequalities, housing conditions, educational opportunities and poverty are all connected. A lifetime ago, I worked in the health service, and we were proud of but challenged by the Black report, which drew attention to all those facts. We have known about them since 1980, and have had the opportunity to do something about them over the years. We made some progress under the Blair Government, and we began to look at poverty, particularly child poverty, in the early days of the Scottish Parliament, but we need to do much more. All these issues are connected. If one part of that jigsaw is in the wrong place, the life chances and life opportunities of all those families and young people are badly affected.

I close by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East again. She was absolutely right to be challenging about what we all have to do, what all Governments have to do and what all local authorities have to do. It is only by working together that we will begin to make a difference for the people who rely on us to do that.

[Dawn Butler (in the Chair)]

I would like to leave a couple of minutes at the end for the mover of the debate to wind up. I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.