One in four working-age people and one in six pensioners with a terminal illness die in poverty every year here
by Bill Heaney
A Marie Curie report, Dying in Poverty in Scotland 2025, has revealed that one in four working age people and one in six older people still die in poverty at the end of their lives.
The care at home and hospice charity considers that terminal illness exacerbates existing inequality and deepens the inverse care law where people in the most need of support are least likely to receive it.
And that symptoms of terminal illness and diagnosis can result in higher energy and housing costs can force both a dying person and their carers to reduce their working hours or give up paid work entirely.
It concludes that more must be done to target support to people at the end of life and their carers.
And it has drawn attention to the fact that there have been calls for the Scottish Government to take action to prevent people from dying in end of life poverty.
Paul Sweeney, a Labour MSP, who promoted the debate, said that while LibDem Liam McArthur’s Assisted Dying Bill was making its way through the Holyrood chamber it was “good and proper that the Parliament takes a moment to consider end-of-life poverty in Scotland”.
He added: “Regardless of members’ views on the bill, it has been made clear from the discussions in the Parliament and across the country that we are all united, by a massive majority, in wanting the best possible support for those who are suffering with terminal illness.
“Ensuring dignity in the final months and days when someone is suffering from a terminal illness should be a paramount consideration for the Parliament.
“No one needs to die in poverty, spending their final moments worrying about bills, how to afford their final meal or the implications for their loved ones.
“Unfortunately, as the preliminary data from Marie Curie’s 2025 report shows, dying in poverty is still the norm in too much of Scotland.
“We want to believe that we live in a land where everyone dies in the comfort of their own bed, surrounded by family and friends, in a peaceful, dignified and pain-free way, but a staggering one in four working-age people and one in six pensioners with a terminal illness die in poverty every year in this country.
“We can all agree that that is completely unacceptable.”
Mr Sweeney said Scotland remains such an unequal society in so many ways—most notably, in relation to income—and a closer look at the figures shows that areas such as my home city of Glasgow are affected the most, with one in three working-age people dying in poverty.
“A legacy of deindustrialisation, austerity and social neglect has led to too many of my constituents spending their whole lives, from the cradle to the grave, in poverty—indeed, it is a life sentence before they are even born.
“Where there should be dignity and support, instead, there is a constant, exhausting and overwhelming battle that does not end until their untimely passing.”
In the past couple of weeks, he added, there has been news of a credit union’s funeral plans being pulled at a moment’s notice by a completely unscrupulous provider, which shows that, even in death, some people are stripped of the dignity of the funeral that they might have planned.
“The fear of the pauper’s funeral still looms large in this country. It is the final indignity—a funeral being stripped from elderly, low-income Scots with no recourse. I hope that we can at least change that.
“The terrible overlap of class and health inequalities was brought home to me, as I have mentioned previously, when I visited the Marie Curie hospice at Stobhill hospital.
“I met a lady there who was suffering from terminal throat cancer. She had grown up in Bridgeton and had had a difficult upbringing—she had been involved in drug taking and various other things.
“She had two young boys and had just got her life back on track, or so she thought. She had had a persistent cough and a sore throat, and she went to the doctor umpteen times to try to get help.
“She was sent away with painkillers and told that it was just an infection. By the time she got a referral and was diagnosed, she had incurable throat cancer. She was in her late forties.
“I walked around the hospice and was suddenly confronted with this most horrendous, shattering story. What do you even say to someone in that situation?
“She felt that she had been robbed of her life because, due to her upbringing, she was not taken seriously and was unable to advocate for herself. She was suffering a terminal illness; she was going to die.
“What were the implications for her? What about her young kids? It was a really difficult conversation, but we tried to turn it into something positive by talking about the impact that she had had on her children and how they were doing really well.
“We tried to gather some degree of positivity from the situation. She made the point that, if she had grown up in Bearsden rather than Bridgeton, she might still be alive today. I got a call just the day afterwards to say that she had passed away.
“In many ways, we need to think about the reality of the avoidable deaths that happen every day in Scotland because of this economic and social problem, and about the lack of equality.”
Despite all the immense work that hospices and our national health service do, too many people are simply stripped of dignity at the end of their lives. Too many people are robbed of the ability to die at home, rather than in a horrible clinical setting in a hospital.
“That does not have to be the world that we live in. Marie Curie made a number of recommendations in its report that would help us to alleviate poverty and dying and to take the burdens off those in their end-of-life journey.
“One way would be for the Scottish Government and local authorities to work together to exempt terminally ill people from paying council tax, similar to the Manchester discretionary council tax support scheme.
“That would lift the financial burden for those close to death and would be a small step in creating a state that cares actively for those who are dying and recognises the struggles that they are going through by minimising the stress of what is an already impossible situation to come to terms with.
“I realise that I have only touched on the initial findings of this fine report. I am sure that colleagues from across the chamber will highlight its other important findings during the debate.
“It is important to stress,” he told MSPs, “that we in the chamber have the power to end the scourge of end-of-life poverty. It could happen to a family member or a friend of ours, or it could be us—who knows?
“We can build a social security system that is once again a truly cradle-to-grave system of protection. If we do not do that, the consequence will be that large numbers of our fellow Scots will continue to suffer the humiliation and indignity of suffering at the end of life.
“I thank Marie Curie and Loughborough University for releasing the preliminary findings ahead of the publication of the full report, “Dying in Poverty in Scotland 2025”, to enable us to have this debate.”
Top of page picture: Dumbarton cemetery has been last resting place for many people who have ended their life in poverty.