Falkirk Council plan hopes new plan will help deal with 'stubbornly high' local poverty levels

During the meeting, scheduled to take place on Tuesday, May 14, councillors will be looking at the proposal – entitled Building a Fairer Falkirk – which states one in four children in Falkirk are living in “relative poverty”.

The council currently has two strategies to try and offset this grim statistic, Towards a Fairer Falkirk and the annual Child Poverty Action Plan.

It is proposed to these initiatives be “aligned” into a “single, overarching strategy” to tackle poverty.

Tuesday’s report will give members of the committee a look at the council’s proposed strategy for addressing poverty and inequalities for the next five years, from 2024 to 2029.

The new strategy aims to help support stronger and healthier communities, promote opportunities and educational attainment and reduce inequalities and supporti a thriving economy and green transition.

The report states: “A key outcome within the new anti-poverty strategy is ensuring transport is affordable, available and convenient. Poverty and transport are clearly linked with public transport being a barrier to accessing employment and services.

“The Local Transport Strategy1 seeks to address this issue through more active and sustainable transport, and has inclusion as one of its four values.”

The new strategy recognises the council itself cannot “lift people out of poverty” but it does have measures it can put in place to empower people to maximise their income through their entitlement to benefits and other support, help people to make the most of their ability to earn enough money to reach a good standard of living and can work to overcome the structural barriers which hold people back and prevent them from achieving their aspirations.

The strategy provides clear direction to ensure it assists people to reach the point where they are well informed about how they can maximise their income and reduce their living costs and how they can gain access to the opportunities and integrated support they need to enter, sustain and progress into and within fair work. .