Council Executive will consider the new Local Child Poverty Action Report (LCPAR) 2025/26 for West Lothian at its meeting on 10 November.
The LCPAR has been produced collaboratively by the West Lothian Community Planning Partnership, including West Lothian Council and NHS Lothian, and sets out how partners will work together to reduce child poverty and improve outcomes for children and families across West Lothian.
The latest national statistics estimate that 21% of children in Scotland were living in relative poverty after housing costs during the period 2022-25, based on a three-year rolling average. This remains substantially above the statutory target of less than 10% by 2030.
Evidence shows that a significant number of West Lothian families continue to experience poverty and financial hardship, and significant inequalities persist for many households.
The latest estimate* indicates that 4,736 children in West Lothian were living in poverty after housing costs in 2025, representing 13.8% of all children in the area. This compares with 14.5% in 2024.
While West Lothian's child poverty rate remains below the Scottish average, child poverty continues to be a significant challenge locally, affecting almost one in seven children.
The report highlights a wide range of activity already being delivered across West Lothian to address the drivers of child poverty, including tailored employability support for parents, income maximisation services, targeted use of poverty data and closer partnership working to support families experiencing financial hardship.
Looking ahead, the new Child Poverty Action Plan 2026-2028 will focus on increasing benefit uptake, supporting parental employment and progression, strengthening partnership working, improving responses to food insecurity, enhancing data-led approaches to identifying unmet need, and embedding the voices of people with lived experience in the design and delivery of services.
Through continued collaboration, targeted interventions and a greater emphasis on data-led approaches, partners will continue to work towards reducing child poverty and improving outcomes for children and families across West Lothian.
(*Please note the latest local figures are based on a revised Department for Work and Pensions methodology, which provides a more robust measure of household income and establishes a new baseline for local reporting. These figures currently provide only two years of comparable local data, so a significant proportion of the change may reflect improvements in measurement and data quality rather than a confirmed reduction in poverty levels.)
