The level of poverty in the Capital has been slammed as an ‘absolute disgrace’ by the city’s council leader as she detailed plans to open new neighbourhood centres to fight the crisis.
It comes as around 80,000 people in Edinburgh – including one in five children – face relative poverty.
Under plans set out by the council, five new ‘neighbourhood partnership centres’ will be built in parts of the city facing hardship.
With funding from the Scottish Government, they will see the council, voluntary organisations and other relevant agencies brought together under one roof to provide support.
The first one is planned to open in Pilton, with hopes that four more will follow.
Labour council leader Jane Meagher said: “It’s an absolute disgrace that we have a rich city with those levels of poverty sitting alongside it.
“It is a very serious challenge, with around 80,000 people living in relative poverty, including one in five children.
“It’s emotionally challenging to think about the missed opportunities some of these children are facing, and that it’s at the cost of this city and the country more widely.”
The plans come in advance of figures on poverty from an independent group of citizens set to be published at the end of the month.
Edinburgh has consistently held some of the most and least deprived neighbourhoods in Scotland.
Scottish Government data published in 2020 found that parts of Muirhouse, Granton, Wester Hailes and Niddrie were among the 5% most deprived areas of the country.
And the same data found that Stockbridge, Morningside and Cramond were among the 10% least deprived areas.
Describing the new centres, Cllr Meagher said: “We know we’ve got to get better at preventing poverty, and we need to improve how we deliver services for our communities.
“The idea is to treat prevention as essential, not optional. In five local communities where there are high levels of deprivation, there’ll be a hub for people who are in need of support.
“All the organisations there will be those which are most able to contribute to helping people, from the voluntary sector to health to council officers.
“Instead of people who currently need help and support having to go lots of different places and locations, they can go to one place.”
She added that combining services under one roof would allow for people’s experiences with support services to be made easier.
Last week, the council leader attended the End Poverty Edinburgh conference, where she met with people in the Capital who had been in poverty or homeless.
It is one of three anti-poverty events to be held in the city this month, with a rally and a publication launch taking place later on in the month.
On October 31, the Edinburgh Poverty Commission, a group of citizens concerned with poverty, are set to launch a report about the state of the crisis.
A previous report of theirs, published in September 2020, said that poverty was ‘real and damaging’, but not inevitable, and noted that nobody in Edinburgh lived in persistent poverty.
At the conference, Cllr Meagher said she found it ‘illuminating and challenging’ to hear about the experiences of residents who had faced hardship.
By Joseph Sullivan Local Democracy Reporter
The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) is a public service news agency. It is funded by the BBC, provided by the local news sector (in Edinburgh that is Reach plc (the publisher behind Edinburgh Live and The Daily Record) and used by many qualifying partners. Local Democracy Reporters cover news about top-tier local authorities and other public service organisations.
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