SCOTLAND'S largest city has the highest rate of child poverty, with the problem affecting a third of all youngsters in the Glasgow area, according to campaigners.

There are also a further five local authority areas where more than a quarter of all children are growing up in families that are struggling to get by, the Campaign to End Child Poverty said.

In Dundee, 28 per cent of youngsters are affected, 27 per cent in North Ayrshire and 26 per cent in Clackmannanshire, East Ayrshire and Inverclyde. A new map breaking down child poverty across Scotland showed West Dunbartonshire and North Lanarkshire as having one in four youngsters (25 per cent) suffering.

Across Scotland, 220,000 children are living in poverty - a fifth of all youngsters. In rural areas. almost 19 per cent in the Western Isles and Argyll and Bute are affected.

The group is urging the UK Government to rethink its tax and benefit policies, which could put 100,000 more in poverty by 2020. Neil Mathers, a spokesman, said: "Politicians of all parties, at Westminster and Holyrood, need to act to tackle the root causes of poverty, including low pay and soaring housing and childcare costs."

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said: "It is totally unacceptable that there are children living in poverty in a country as wealthy as Scotland."