Get the stories that matter to you sent straight to your inbox with our daily newsletter. Subscribe Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice Invalid Email

LEADING charities have united in a desperate attempt to avert the humanitarian crisis of Scotland’s poverty.

Respected organisations including Oxfam, Save the Children, Shelter and Children 1st, have joined forces in a drastic step usually reserved for international conflicts and natural disasters.

The last time Scottish charities pulled together in such a move was to form a Disaster Emergency Committee for war-torn Syria.

The DEC usually call for donations but this time the appeal is for politicians to put poverty at the top of the agenda.

Next month, they will launch a Challenge Poverty Week, as the poor face the “perfect storm” of welfare cuts and rising costs.

Judith Robertson, head of Oxfam Scotland, said: “The fact that we’re coming together to raise the issue of poverty shows how serious we believe the situation is.

“Poverty is a scandal in rich, modern Scotland and Challenge Poverty Week is a chance to demand concrete action from our politicians and policy-makers.”

She said charities were calling for the provision of sustainable jobs, reliable incomes and fair taxation.

Oxfam’s Our Economy report claimed Scotland’s wealthiest households are 273 times richer than the poorest.

The charity say figures show work is not always a route to a better life in Scotland, as figures show 40 per cent of those living in poverty are in employment.

Robertson added: “The reality for too many Scots is a cocktail of high mortality, economic inactivity, mental and physical ill-health, poor educational attainment, and exclusion from the decisions that affect them.”

John Downie, director of public affairs for the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations said that poverty must be a priority.

He said: “Scotland is one of the most unequal places in the developed world, with the gap between the richest and poorest growing steadily.

“It’s shameful that in communities across the country, people are having to choose between heating their homes or putting food on the table.

“Children are going to bed hungry, and parents are struggling to afford to buy their children shoes for school. Surely we can do much better than this?”

The Scottish Government’s annual report for the Child Poverty Strategy for Scotland estimates that an additional 50,000 children will be living in poverty, north of the border by 2020, bringing the total to a quarter of a million.

Statistics suggest 720,000 people, 14 per cent of Scots, live in deprivation but campaigners believe it is nearer 850,000.

The Trussell Trust this year found the number of Scots using food banks rose by 150 per cent in 2012, from 5726 to 14,318.

Shelter Scotland director GraemeBrown said that more and more people were facing the real prospect of homelessness.

He added: “There’s a perfect storm on our doorsteps. Already people are being battered by welfare reforms, stagnant wages, rising utility bills, higher living costs and job insecurity.

“For many, the safety and security of home is under threat like never before.”

The Poverty Alliance are co-ordinating the action and urging people to push for change by lobbying their MSPs.

They have written to the party leaders at Holyrood to ask them to take part in challenge poverty meetings with activists fighting deprivation on the ground.

Peter Kelly of the Poverty Alliance said: “We want to have them meet with activists who will talk to them about what the main poverty challenges are for them, and to ask what the main priorities are for action by the party leaders.”

Kelly said the action was being taken before Scotland’s poor were locked further into a downward spiral of despair.

Factors such as the bedroom tax and rising food and utility costs are likely to reverse any positive trends of recent years.

Kelly added: “It is only going to get worse. All the predictions are that poverty, specifically child poverty, is going to go up again.”

John McKendrick, a senior lecturer at Caledonian University who co-wrote a report on tackling child poverty for Save the Children, said there had been much rhetoric but little effective action.

He said: “Lots of nice words have been said but there is no direct addressing of the problem.

“The hopelessness that is there will intensify. For those in poverty life is getting tougher.”

The Child Poverty Action Group in Scotland said that there was no chance of the Government hitting legal targets to eradicate child poverty by 2020.

John Dickie, head of the charity, said: “Child poverty in Scotland is going to increase massively.

“We are facing a child poverty crisis. Now is the time for politicians to turn their words into concrete action that will ensure that every child gets a fair start in life.”

Statistics from the Campaign To End Child Poverty show an average of one in three children in Glasgow live in poverty – the highest percentage in Scotland.

In the city’s Springburn, 51 per cent of youngsters live in poverty, while in Calton it is 49 per cent.

Save the Children’s Scottish leader Neil Mathers said: “Poverty is a scar on Scotland’s society.

“This is an exciting opportunity for us to come together and look at what we can all do to consign poverty to history and rid it from our shores once and for all.”