HEARTBREAK OF PEOPLE DYING IN POVERTY: SPECIAL REPORT PART II

Scottish Labour MP Paul Sweeney outside St Stephen’s Entrance to the Houses of Parliament, London.

Labour MSP Paul Sweeney, the Marie Curie daffodil emblem and Cabinet Secretary Jenni Minto.

By Bill Heaney

The heart-rending issue of people dying in poverty will not become a political football to be kicked around the Holyrood parliament chamber.

The SNP Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health, Jenni Minto, pledged: “We have to approach the issue from a very non-political perspective and work together to get the best results for the people of Scotland.”

She added: “I extend my thanks to Paul Sweeney for bringing this incredibly important and relevant motion to Parliament. The dying in the margins exhibition and research have remained with me, as they have with him, and I reference them very often in my role.

“I put on the record my heartfelt thanks to every member of Marie Curie staff and every volunteer across Scotland for everything that they do, day in, day out, to support people who are terminally ill, their families and loved ones.

“There will be few—if any—in the chamber whose lives have not been touched at some point and in some way by the issues that Marie Curie does such remarkable work to tackle. It is right that we all acknowledge that work, and I thank all members for their contributions.

“Elena Whitham mentioned the importance of talking about the reality of death and dying. I agree whole-heartedly with her point, and I do that as a constituency MSP whenever I get the opportunity.

“Liz Smith, as always, made a thoughtful and practical contribution. I recognise a lot of the points that she raised.

“Carol Mochan, your description of poverty being an anchor was resounding and I thank you for that. I will remind myself of that, because you are right that it is the people who are impacted, and it is the people we need to think about. I cannot disagree with any of the sentiments that you or your colleague Richard Leonard expressed in your contributions.

Jenni Minto added: “As Miles Briggs said, raising awareness of the issue is so important. Bob Doris talked about the actions proposed in the Marie Curie report on social tariffs to protect people who are living with terminal illness from spiralling energy bills and to address recent real-terms cuts and freezes in working-age benefits.

“The Scottish Government is assessing the report and looking at where we can make changes. I will touch first on the social tariff mechanism. We have repeatedly called on the UK Government to introduce a social tariff, and we have been working with the current UK Government on that. We have convened a working group made up of energy suppliers and consumer organisations to establish how a social tariff could operate. We have had a positive meeting with the UK Government and we will share the outputs of that. That is an example of Governments working together, which Bob Doris and Paul Sweeney spoke about.”

Paul Sweeney asked Ms Minto to consider looking at forthcoming legislation and the Housing (Scotland) Bill, in discussion with her colleague the Minister for Housing, to place more obligations on landlords to make necessary adaptations for people who are facing a terminal illness, so that they are more likely to stay in their own home?

On that specific question, she replied: “I am sure that Mr McLennan [the Housing Minister] will be listening to the debate and taking heed of the points that are being raised.

“A number of members have mentioned the situation with ethnic minorities and actions to access equitable healthcare. The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care [Neil Gray] has called out racism as a major public health issue, and we are working closely with health boards across Scotland to improve access to and experiences of healthcare, taking a proactive anti-racism approach. I recognise the concerns that members have raised.

“On fuel poverty, the warmer homes Scotland scheme has been allocated £65 million this financial year—its highest budget to date—and we are now increasing that by a further £20 million to support even more households.

“In recognition of the pressure on household budgets, our winter heating payment was uprated by 10.1 per cent for winter 2023-24 and a further 6.7 per cent for winter 2024-25. Just last Thursday, the Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Shirley-Anne Somerville, announced that we will be bringing forward regulations for next winter to introduce a universal pension age winter heating payment. All pensioner households, including those with a person of pension age who is terminally ill, will get support with their heating costs. That is not available elsewhere.

“Elena Whitham mentioned the Scottish child payment. It is not possible to pay the Scottish child payment to families with dependent children under 16 on presentation of a BASRIS form, because that does not relate to entitlement to a qualifying reserved benefit.

However, the Scottish child payment is just one part of our radically different Scottish social security system, in which we fast track disability assistance applications from terminally ill people, and in which terminally ill people automatically receive the highest rates of disability assistance that they are entitled to. Importantly, there are no time limits on the definition of terminal illness. That decision is made by clinicians.

“A minimum income guarantee has the potential to deliver transformational change and reduce poverty and equality. We are looking forward to receiving the final report from our minimum income guarantee expert group, which is likely to be early in the new year.

“As part of the record spending that was announced in the budget, we are supporting the delivery of the highest standards of palliative care and are strongly committed to equitable access to it. As other members have noted, that is why we published our draft palliative care strategy for consultation, which I believe closes on 10 January—it is certainly early in the new year.

“That is an absolutely important piece of work, and I encourage everyone in the chamber and more widely to contribute to it, because, as Elena Whitham said, we need to ensure that we are thinking about the best deaths for people.”

Jenni Minto said the Scottish Government would be working to ensure partnership working with hospices to ensure they are strengthened and they already had important connections with the Scottish Ambulance Service, which provides home support with Macmillan Cancer Support.

On Miles Briggs’s potential member’s bill, she promised to meet him and Marie Curie representatives early in the New Year.