Lesley Riddoch: Constitutional change won’t help kids

Will independence stop Scottish babies being born with genetic damage caused by poverty? If Scots can possibly tolerate another question, this one might radically focus popular debate.

We’ve had Alex Salmond’s independence question. We’ve had a possible second devo max question. We’ve had a weekend to mull over David Cameron’s recent non-question, and the taxman’s PAYE questions about Rangers FC.

The question we have not yet asked is one which can put the dry mechanics of constitutional debate into a human context and get top political Scotsmen to focus on life, not power.

Not my words but those of Alan Sinclair, a founder of the Wise Group – Scotland’s largest social enterprise – and adviser to the last UK government on skills and training. After being awarded a CBE for his efforts, Sinclair had a Damascene conversion to the cause of early years intervention and coined the phrase about Scotland trying (and failing) to retrofit life skills on to damaged teenagers instead of equipping them properly from birth. He also observed that countries with the most evidence about the benefits of early years intervention – Britain and the US – have done least about it, while those with fully-funded early years care for decades – the Nordics and north Europeans – gathered the smallest evidence base before deciding to act.

In short, Sinclair suspects the laudable-sounding search for more evidence is acting as a dead hand on progress in Scotland – which sits, after all, in one of the wealthiest nations on earth.

It’s surprising, then, that this Work Foundation fellow has just completed a study to see how “just get on with it” nations like Finland and the Netherlands work better for children. His report published today, Early Years and Transformational Change, suggests constitutional change could be far less important for our children than a straightforward change in political priorities which could start tomorrow.

Family centres exist in most Dutch neighbourhoods – the centrepiece is a mother and baby wellbeing clinic which delivers support from birth until school age. Clinics are staffed by doctors who attend to health, social and emotional development, motor skills, language and general health, and nurses who concentrate on baby care, parenting, feeding, toileting and sleeping. Support starts early and is truly comprehensive for all babies and all parents. From this solid base of trust gained through regular and personal contact in a universal system, special help can be offered when it’s needed.

Sinclair observes: “The health system in Scotland looks at technical health. In Holland, it looks at the child in the round: its development, language, emotional life and how its parent(s) do or don’t cope.”

Similarly, in Finland, a maternity grant is made available to all mothers on condition they register the pregnancy and attend the local health centre. This “everyone” system of health-based care allows the most needy “someone” to be reached quickly without stigma or overbearing surveillance. In Scotland, health is a totally devolved area of policy – although the conditions attached to maternity grants are currently reserved to Westminster. Reform Scotland has proposed this split should remain in its submission to the Scotland Bill consultation. Mind you, without clear plans on tackling child poverty, why would control of maternity benefit look like a power worth fighting about? This is precisely where the current constitutional debate is failing us – powers first and purpose second.

During his inquiries, Sinclair asked a colleague who spent half her life in Holland and the second half in Scotland to sum up the difference between the two nations. “In Scotland you tolerate children,” she said, “in Holland we love children.”

It hurts to hear that. But her anecdotal evidence is backed up by international study. In 2007 Unicef published wellbeing statistics through 40 different measures. Holland came top with Finland slightly behind. The UK ranked alongside Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – ex-Soviet satellites. An estimate put Scotland below the UK score. How will the status quo, devo max or independence change this?

Last year, I asked then children’s minister Angela Constance when early years care and intervention will be properly funded. She said we must wait until Scotland becomes independent and controls all fiscal levers and all available income streams. I asked if that meant another set of Scottish children will meantime grow up without a fighting chance of happiness or equality. The long pause that followed (along with both questions) were omitted from the final broadcast because the BBC now limits “random” mention of independence in non-news programmes.

This is precisely the wrong way around. Can constitutional change improve literacy, health, business innovation and children’s wellbeing? And how – beyond the oft-presumed post-independence feelgood factor?

Brazil is the eighth-largest and fastest-growing economy in the world. It gained independence from Portugal in 1822. It is also the world’s most unequal society according to the “Gini coefficient” inequality index. Two hundred years of independence haven’t tackled that.

Mind you, just five places behind sits the UK – the most unequal society in Europe. Three hundred years of political union haven’t tackled that either. As things stand, an independent Scotland would usurp Britain’s inequality crown. Mind you, devolution alone is just as unlikely to create a new dynamic for social change.

So here’s the thing: Constitutional experts want to know whether a yes vote in the referendum without Section 30 powers would constitute a legal mandate for separation. I want to know how independence will transform Scotland through an early years revolution.

I’ve a good idea whose question is likely to be super-served with answers, column inches, analysis and energetic obfuscation in the months ahead.

Alex Salmond was right when he dismissed David Cameron’s gentlemanly sabre-rattling over the loss of UN Security Council membership in an independent Scotland. Scots are more concerned with the impact of independence on their everyday lives.

So I want to know how babies, children and young mums will gain resources, attention, respect and profile as the direct result of a yes vote in the referendum. I’d like the same question answered by supporters of the status quo.

And if those answers reveal unity across the constitutional divide through manifest lack of interest, I will conclude, like Sinclair, that Implementation Deficit Syndrome is Scotland’s real constitutional problem – nothing more and nothing less.