Bringing Hope, Building Futures: Tackling child poverty delivery plan 2026-2031 – annex 2: Analysis of consultation and engagement

9. Understanding challenges

Chapter 9 provides an overview of respondents’ recommendations for how the Scottish Government can better understand the challenges faced by families at greatest risk of poverty to ensure their specific and interconnected needs are met. While there is some similarity with the previous chapter, which considered the suggested ways to implement the strategic themes, this chapter builds on that analysis with specific examples of the recommended ways to engage with different groups and working to meet the diverse needs of those families at greatest risk of poverty.

Question 7. What more can we do to understand the challenges being faced by the family at greatest risk of poverty, including the six priority families identified to ensure their specific and interconnected needs are met?

Lived experience engagement and co-production

Over half of those answering Question 7 highlighted the importance of engaging with people who have lived experience. They believed that this would enable more person-centred approaches and support. A few of these respondents noted that lived experience engagement was not only an effective way to learn about barriers and challenges, but also necessary to understand the unique cultural, social and economic situations of the families at risk. This theme was also raised in engagement events, with an emphasis on the need to include children and young people’s lived experience.

Suggestions for how to conduct lived experience engagements included:

• Encouraging sustained engagement to truly understand perspectives and challenges.
• Establishing participatory forums and focus groups.
• Consultation and running lived experience panels, particularly with the six priority family groups.
• Considering intersectionality and conducting research with families with multiple disadvantages to understand the multitude of barriers they face.
• Conducting research with lived experience groups around Scotland to ensure experiences of living in different areas are captured.

Some respondents emphasised the importance of collaborating with organisations or partners that already have established trusting relationships. They felt that this would enable practitioners to engage in a way that was empathetic, culturally sensitive and flexible to the families’ needs. Another felt a current barrier to capturing lived experience was a desire not to overburden families who may have other commitments.

Some respondents emphasised the importance of funding, and particularly long-term funding, in delivering the changes that could be suggested through lived experience engagement. These respondents noted that taking the time to listen to families is only the first step in the process, and that without the ability or resources to make the necessary changes, it could lead to a breakdown in trust between families and the organisations who support them.

Data collection and data sharing

Several respondents noted the importance of data collection with the different priority groups and explicit dissemination across different support and services to ensure families’ specific and interconnected needs are met.

Respondents often fell into two categories:

• Those who suggested that data was needed to understand how support and services are working with priority groups and what else could be done to assist families at greatest risk in poverty.
• Another smaller group who felt that data was needed to promote learning and understanding amongst practitioners and to help them create a trauma-informed approach to families at greatest risk of poverty.

Of these, several also expressed the view that existing data is inadequate, and some emphasised the importance of sharing data and learning to ensure data has the greatest benefit and reach.

Some respondents stressed the importance of quantitative data collection, particularly for the six priority groups. For example, one respondent noted that much of the data available about minority ethnic groups living in poverty is qualitative, which provides anecdotal evidence, but felt that quantitative data is also needed to understand broader trends. Another respondent noted, for example, that the Family Resource Survey has a very small sample from the six priority family groups. However, another respondent felt that good progress had been made in collecting quantitative data using the Low Income Family Tracker (LIFT) programme.

Other suggestions on data collection methodologies included the following from a small number of respondents:

• Calls to disaggregate data to understand intersections of inequality, particularly among the six priority family groups. This was also raised in engagement events.
• Increased understanding of outcomes on the local level, including the monitoring and evaluation of programmes (see Chapter 7).
• One respondent mentioned a new approach, of using a microsample, that they were taking to ensure sampling from priority groups or groups with low representation.

Singular respondents reflected on types of data that they felt should be collected, including health and wellbeing data, and information on levels of uptake of services and support. One respondent proposed having unique child IDs to enable cross-service data linkage.