EIGHT Scottish charities will today launch a campaign to highlight a humanitarian crisis in Scotland, which they say is being ignored.

The Scotland's Outlook campaign includes a spoof TV weather forecast in which a smooth presenter becomes increasingly flustered by the statistics on rising levels of poverty across the country.

A weather map showing signs for "severe poverty warnings"around Scotland is backed by several claims that the nation is set to experience a poverty "super storm" by 2020 if policies are not changed.

The charities uniting for the campaign say a fifth of children in Scotland are now living below the breadline, while 23,000 people had to rely on food banks at some point in the last six months.

Macmillan, Shelter Scotland, Oxfam, Alzheimer Scotland, Children's Hospice Association Scotland (CHAS), Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG), the Poverty Alliance and the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) are all supporting a drive to encourage people in Scotland to join the fight against fuel poverty, hunger and homelessness.

The campaign says more than 870,000 people in Scotland now do not have enough to live on according to official definitions.

Martin Sime, SCVO chief executive said: "With nearly a million people in Scotland living in poverty, we have a humanitarian crisis on our hands and we need everyone's help to tackle it.

"Thousands of people are turning to food banks, struggling to heat their homes and to clothe themselves and their children. It's not right."

John Dickie, head of CPAG in Scotland, said: "Independent forecasts predict an explosion in child poverty levels in the coming years as so much of the benefit and tax credit support that millions of families in and out of work rely on is ripped away. We can and must bring about changes to our economy, social security system and public services that are needed to protect all our citizens from this poverty storm."

The campaign launch was backed by Hazel Ratcliffe, a lone parent living in Fife. She called for more support for lone parents to find work and access affordable childcare. "I did not want to be a single mum on benefits, like you see on the news. Those mums were portrayed as lazy scroungers and I definitely was not like that.

"I really wanted to work, but every way I turned I was hit with barriers" she said. "I think there needs to be more support for lone parents accessing employment, but from an early stage."

The campaign argues politicians have failed to make an impact on the way poverty is handed down the generations and says the public can make a difference, by getting involved with anti-poverty projects, volunteering and fundraising.