Renfrewshire MSP slams Tory candidates for "silence" on child poverty
dailyrecord.co.ukMSP Tom Arthur has slammed the Tory leadership candidates for their ‘silence’ on child poverty as a new report highlights the scale of the cost of living with Westminster.A new report from Citizens Advice Scotland on Universal Credit underlines the struggles households across Scotland are facing - revealing that the need for food banks has grown by almost a third (31%) since September 2021.The report calls for Westminster to immediately uprate Universal Credit and all legacy benefits, a suspension of sanctions, scrapping the benefit cap and the two-child limit, pausing the collection of all DWP and HMRC debts, and converting all Advance Payments at the beginning of UC claims into non-repayable assessment period grants. Don't miss the latest headlines from around Renfrewshire.
Sign up to our newsletters here. While recent research has shown that the efforts of the SNP Scottish Government is making a real difference to those struggling, through actions such as uprating devolved benefits and introducing the ‘game changing’ Scottish Child Payment, Tom Arthur has said ‘progress is being undermined by decades of Westminster austerity policies and a Tory leadership contest ignoring the cost of living crisis.’Mr Arthur, SNP MSP for Renfrewshire South, said: “It is utterly shameful to see such an increase in foodbank use in a place as wealthy as the UK.
Yet, sadly, it’s not surprising that families in Renfrewshire South are struggling to get by as prices continue to rise but Westminster fails to take any meaningful action to help
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