International review of approaches to tackling child poverty: Comparative summary report and key learnings for Scotland

Introduction

This report and series of case studies explores the policies, approaches and historical context behind different countries’ choices and how they impact upon child poverty. This is in the context of the Scottish Government’s central priority of eradicating child poverty in Scotland. Understanding and exploring the different routes taken in other countries to tackling child poverty is a critical part of achieving this aim.

The Scottish Parliament unanimously passed the Child Poverty (Scotland) Act in 2017, setting legally-binding targets, including that by 2030 less than 10% of children should live in relative poverty after housings costs (AHC).^[1] Meeting these targets requires significant and continued action to tackle the core drivers of poverty. The latest child poverty rates for Scotland show that relative AHC child poverty reduced from 26% in 2022/23 to 22% in 2023/24, falling short of the interim targets of 18%.[2] This work has been commissioned to understand lessons for Scotland from other international approaches so that learning can help inform the next Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan, covering the period 2026-31.

Specifically, the research explores the key factors that have either reduced child poverty levels or enabled them to remain at consistently low levels; the policies that have been central to achieving those outcomes; the extent to which the Government has, in each case, influenced these outcomes or whether wider factors have been at play; and how feasible it is to apply these approaches in a Scottish context, accounting for both the historical differences and availability of policy levers.

Each of the detailed case studies – for Croatia, Denmark, Finland and Slovenia – explore these considerations in depth and are linked to from this summary report. Each of these case study reports acts as a deep dive into the interventions that have been made, the wider political, social and economic context and the outcomes this has had over relevant historical time periods. The purpose of this summary report is to compare and contrast those approaches against key metrics and policy areas to understand where these offer lessons that are relevant to the Scottish context.