If the Viceroy cared about children's mental health, he'd address child poverty
Abbreviated version published in February 10th edition of the Edinburgh Evening News.
I look forward to the Viceroy’s weekly column in the Edinburgh Evening News nearly as much as I do his monthly “Award-winning E-magazine.” Does the Viceroy actually write this stuff or does he tell an aide-de-camp to “knock something up about how depressed Scotland’s kids are and make sure you blame it on the SNP”?
This week he’s going on about children’s mental health which is, admittedly, not great. But don’t worry, the Viceroy tells us. Schools in Edinburgh South are getting free resources from Place2Be, so that should help.
The Viceroy then proceeds to lambast the Scottish administration for reducing money for mental health services, which he claims he can’t understand because, after all, Scotland got a “record investment” from ever-generous Westminster. He asks “where has the extra money gone?” Apart from the fact that Scotland is deliberately kept on a tight fiscal leash and our resources are routinely pilfered, here are a few other reasons we’re skint:
Rachel from accounts Reeves’ employer national insurance hike isn’t fully funded. That pushes up the cost of contracts.
The UK’s replacement for EU structural funding, the so-called UK Shared Prosperity Fund, is 61% less.
Scotland’s allowance, er, Block Grant, has fallen to its lowest share of UK Government spending in nearly a decade. The House of Commons Library showed that the proportion of Westminster spending on Holyrood fell from 8.2% in 2015/16 to 7.6% as of July 2024. This means Scotland’s allowance was worth £6.4b less than in 2020/21, a 12.7% drop. Reeves’ paltry £1.4b increase doesn’t cut it.
Has it occurred to the Viceroy that poverty isn’t good for children’s mental health? Kids living in poverty go without things most take for granted, like a warm coat, enough food to eat, a warm home and parents who aren’t stressed out about the lack of money.
They miss out on the things that make life enjoyable - family holidays, small treats, toys and games, school trips, socialising with friends. So it’s not surprising that children living in poverty have lower self-esteem and are more likely to be depressed and anxious.
So what is English Labour doing about it? Precious little.
The Viceroy and 36 other English Labour MPs in Scotland voted against ditching the 2-child benefit cap even though it would lift 25,000 Scottish children out of poverty.
Here’s another suggestion: the Viceroy could urge Sir Keir to introduce an Essentials Guarantee to cover the cost of food, household bills and travel so that 140,000 Scots, including 30,000 children, would no longer have to live in poverty.
The fact that Scotland’s poverty rate (25%) is below that of England (30%) and Wales (29%) is cold comfort. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation says the reason Scotland is bucking the UK trend is because of the Scottish Child Payment and the Scottish administration’s efforts to mitigate the 2-child limit.
Social welfare policies work. In other words, Poverty is a political choice. But Scotland controls just 20% of social spending. So it’s Westminster policies that are the main drivers of child poverty. If Westminster and the Viceroy wanted to, they could learn from Scotland.
How does Scotland get the power to make the political choice to end poverty? It’s not by remaining in the failing UK, where we’re treated as an expendable and exploitable vassal.
It’s by ditching the union. Then it’s about putting power back in the hands of the People and establishing a government whose primary allegiance is to the People who put them in power.
Only then will we have a real government - one with a central bank, sovereign currency and policies that put the People above the bloodsucking City of London, corporate welfare junkies and the useless career politicians like the Viceroy who obsequiously do their bidding.
Exploding with power Leah. Nobody does these relentless exposures better than yourself. Hope Viceroy and his court get to read it but I don’t see it being printed as it’s far too lethal.
Thanks Leah. Absolutely disgusting those greedy Labour London HQ'd jobsworths in Scotland, who voted to keep children in poverty, they should hang their heads in shame, just despicable...including the trougher who is our 'MP' in Edinburgh. LabCons are going for max damage to Scotland, and they know too many fall for the BritEng/Nats' propaganda blaming the SNP for all of their English masters' despicable austerity on the poor.
Put nothing at all past them, to come up with some shiney beads in the run up to the Scottish election in 2026, the LABOURcons are not daft, they are incredibly sleekit, immoral, unethical, selfserving and cruel.
Hope the SNP keep shouting from the rooftops about EngGov reducing the 'block grant' they 'send' to Scotland (with added contempt!) once they've taken Scotland's vast revevues and resources, worth £trillions, not £billions.
I think of it like the mafia, nasty dangerous bullies, who take what they see as theirs, and hand a couple of £'s back in an envelope, told to shut up or else. Owned, certainly not equal, and not respected. Scotland is so scammed by the country next door it's tragic, but I hope people see sense. The polls must be scaring the BritEng establishment right now and their dodgy pals abroad!