Child Poverty Peer Support Network
Upcoming sessions will focus on:
- 20th August - Income Maximisation for families with children, 10:00-11:30 Teams. The focus of this session is to support local authority leads to maximise uptake of entitlements amongst low-income families.
- 17th September - Local Child Poverty Action Reports, 10:00-11:30 Teams. This session will provide an overview of Year 7 LCPAR analysis and plans for Year 8.
For further information, recordings and notes from previous PSN sessions, including the recent Q&A session with child poverty experts on changes to the child poverty data, contact childpoverty@improvementservice.org.uk
New Upcoming Events Webpage
We have launched a new webpage providing an up-to-date overview of upcoming sessions hosted by the IS that may be of interest to those working to tackle child poverty locally, alongside further information about relevant networks supported by the IS, and their membership.
We aim to highlight upcoming sessions across the networks, enabling practitioners to remain informed, connected, and able to participate in those of interest.
Publications
New Blog: Tackling Child Poverty Through Community Wealth Building
In a new blog, Isabella Williams, Child Poverty Project Officer, and Mia Duncan, Community Wealth Building Project Officer, explore the strong links between Scotland’s child poverty and Community Wealth Building agendas. They explain how CWB’s focus on fair work, inclusive ownership, local spending, and community assets can help address the root causes of poverty by creating local economies that work better for families.
The blog highlights the opportunities for local authorities and health boards to align Community Wealth Building plans with Local Child Poverty Action Reports, alongside practical examples such as Fife Council’s Life Chances model, which supports people facing barriers to employment into fair and sustainable work.
Marketing and promotion of Health Harming Commodities
New Briefing: What Action Can Local Government Take on Health-Harming Commodity Marketing?
A new elected member briefing from the Improvement Service explores how local government can help reduce health inequalities by limiting the marketing and promotion of health-harming commodities, including tobacco, alcohol, gambling, and foods high in fat, salt and sugar.
The briefing highlights growing evidence that advertising for these products is often concentrated in more disadvantaged communities and along routes used by children and families, contributing to poorer health outcomes and widening inequalities. It sets out the role local authorities can play through advertising, planning, sponsorship and policy decisions to create healthier local environments.
IS supports local authorities to tackling the Rural Childcare Challenge
The Improvement Service’s Child Poverty Team is launching a new programme of activity to help address one of the most significant barriers facing families in Scotland’s rural and island communities: access to childcare.
In a recent blog, Rural Child Poverty Officer James Taylor highlights how limited access to affordable, flexible and high-quality childcare continues to affect family wellbeing, employment opportunities and efforts to tackle child poverty.
The blog outlines the unique challenges faced by rural and island communities, including workforce shortages, dispersed populations, funding pressures and transport barriers, all of which make childcare services more difficult to sustain than in urban areas.
In response, the Child Poverty Team has identified rural childcare as a key priority for 2026 and will be working with local and national partners to explore solutions, share learning and test new approaches. This includes a new Rural Childcare series of events, taking place between September and November, alongside continued engagement through the Rural Child Poverty Network.
Stay Connected
For further information on any of the items featured in this newsletter, or to join our Child Poverty Peer Support Network, contact childpoverty@improvementservice.org.uk
Improvement Service | Supporting local action to reduce child poverty and improve outcomes for children and families across Scotland.