SCOTTISH Labour has said it would “repair and renew” the welfare safety net if it was in power at Holyrood, with a guaranteed minimum income for all.
Party leader Anas Sarwar said he also wanted to reverse the “cruellest” aspects of Tory benefit reform, including the two-child limit on certain funds.
Publishing a social security recovery plan while election campaigning in Glasgow, Mr Sarwar said he wanted to address child poverty with a “minimum income guarantee”, with benefits topping up low wages to ensure everyone had an acceptable living standard.
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation calculated that in 2020, a single person would have to earn £19,200 a year to hit that level, and a couple with two children £18,700 each.
The New Economics Foundation calculated a minimum income standard could cost around £80bn a year across the UK, implying a bill of around £7bn for Scotland per year, twice Holyrood's current social security budget.
Around a quarter of Scotland's children live in poverty.
Scottish Labour’s plan came with no cost details - it said it wanted to “work towards” a minimum income standard no one would fall below, with a commission to “work out the precise value in the wake of the pandemic”.
In its manifesto last week, the SNP also said it wanted to “start work” on a minimum income guarantee in the next parliament, but also offered no costings or timescale for delivery.
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Scottish Labour also want to double the Scottish child benefit top-up to £20 a week, plus £5 more for disabled children, with automatic payments so families did not need to apply.
Mr Sarwar said: "If we focus on making the next Scottish Parliament a Covid recovery parliament we can immediately lift as many as 60,000 children out of poverty and work towards ending the scandal of child poverty once and for all.
"We can transform the lives of those Scots who risk falling deeper into poverty year after year by offering them the stability of a guaranteed minimum income.
“Scotland’s powers over social security give us the opportunity not just to repair the safety net after a decade of Tory austerity and SNP inaction, but renew it so it is fit for the challenges of the 21st century.
“A national recovery after Covid should mean a minimum income guarantee for people that no one falls below - restoring dignity to those who have been denied it.
"That means Parliament working together to ensure good jobs, lower housing costs, and a social security system there when people need it.”
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Pam Duncan-Glancy, Scottish Labour's spokesperson on Social Security and Glasgow Kelvin candidate, said: “For too many people, poverty and inequality were all too common before the pandemic, we can't go back to that.
“We need a Parliament focussed on solutions and a recovery that creates good well-paid jobs, keeps housing costs down, and builds a social security system that’s there to make sure everyone has enough money to live on.
“By guaranteeing a Minimum Income Standard that no one would fall below, we'd secure the wellbeing and human rights of all of Scotland's people.
“That work must start straight away because there is not a moment to lose.
“Together we can create a Scotland where every single one of us can live up to our full potential."
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