Programme for Government 2026-31

• Increase the Scottish Child Payment to £40 at the earliest opportunity – with targeted additional payments for families with a baby under one, single parent families and families impacted by disability.
• Commit to following the roadmap to a Minimum Income Guarantee set out by the expert advisory group.
• Mitigate the Young Parent Penalty through the Scottish Child Payment.
• Continue to invest in financial inclusion and debt services, to ensure that families receive all of the financial support that they are entitled to.
• Respond to the public debt crisis by reforming public debt recovery processes – to prevent public debt trapping children and families in poverty, including targeted action to help and support single parent families.

In 2026, the Scottish Government committed to fund specialist child maintenance advice services for families, to ensure that they are able to navigate the child maintenance system and that children receive money that they have the right to. This service will support families across Scotland to understand complex systems, and at the same time work on a policy level to influence systems change longer term.
OPFS is calling on the Scottish Government to:

• Continue to invest in child maintenance support and advice for single parent families in Scotland.

• Increase the School Clothing Grant, and the income threshold for accessing this, in line with inflation, and ensure that eligible families are auto enrolled.
• Extend free school meals to all primary school pupils and commit to introducing universal free school meal provision for all pupils in secondary schools.

• Publish clear information about financial support available to single parent students and how this interacts with paid work and social security systems.
• Review the adequacy of the tailored financial support for single parents entering Higher Education.
• Integrate the voices of single parent students into policy development to help ‘single parent proof’ access to Higher Education.
• Include single parent status within widening access eligibility criteria.

• Expand access to quality employability programmes designed around single parents’ needs.
• Ensure that employers are aware of the unique needs of single parents and work collaboratively to ‘single parent proof’ new policies and existing provisions.
• Increase opportunities for flexible, family-friendly employment across the public sector – and encouraging wider adoption by employers.
• Support single parent progression into higher-paid work through training, skills and lifelong learning.

• A universal funded entitlement of 50 hours per week for children aged six months and above that is free at the point of use for all families.
• A high-quality service which delivers positive outcomes for children and realises children’s rights.
• A diverse and skilled childcare workforce that is valued, fairly paid and gender balanced.
• Flexible delivery that enables families to access childcare when they need and want it.
• Work towards a childcare system that is not based on profit making.

• End the long-term use of temporary accommodation, and ensure that high quality, affordable and accessible accommodation is available for families at the earliest opportunity.
• Accelerate the delivery of new, affordable homes that are suitable for families.
• Improve housing advice and support for families experiencing financial hardship, to ensure that families are aware of their rights.
• Ensure that national and local housing strategies recognise the specific needs of single parent households.

• Link the Just Transition into employability initiatives, so that work to achieve net zero and work to reduce poverty supports each other. Without this interconnectedness there is a risk of reproducing and deepening inequalities.
• Recognise that a Just Transition must include investment in job creation within more carbon neutral sectors such as the care and childcare sectors.
• Investing in public transport as a viable alternative to car use, and as a lever to break down some of the inequalities and barriers facing single parents who already use public transport as their primary means of travel.
• Prioritise households experiencing fuel poverty, such as single parent families, in initiatives to improve energy efficiency and in available support such as grants. Otherwise, such families will be left behind in the transition to net zero.
• Commit to building a Wellbeing Economy in Scotland by redesigning our economy so that it delivers social justice on a healthy planet. This requires economic policies to be focused on dignity, nature, participation, purpose and fairness.

• Pursue more radical tax reform, including overhauling Council Tax and exploring new ways to tax wealth. This could raise substantial additional money, ensuring those with the highest incomes pay more while protecting those on the lowest.