Research finds ten most deprived areas in Britain are in Glasgow

Glasgow has the 10 most deprived areas in Britain, a new study has found.

Despite popular shopping areas, Glasgow has the 10 most deprived areas in the UK

Researchers used census data spanning 40 years from 1971 to 2011 and discovered all 10 most deprived places in this period were in Scotland’s largest city.

The Calton area in the city’s east end had three of the most deprived areas, with the North East having two and one each in the census wards of Canal, Baillieston, Springburn, Govan and Drumchapel/Anniesland.

Researchers used the new data resource PopChange to provide census data for areas one kilometre square, which they said was previously not available.

They used census information on unemployment status, the number of overcrowded households and the level of car access to create a deprivation score for each ward.

The study discovered large increases in deprivation in urban areas including Glasgow, Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham and London in the 40-year period.

The findings also showed a trend of deprivation spreading from the urban areas to their fringes and an increase in the deprivation divide between urban and rural areas.

Few areas suffered higher levels of absolute deprivation in 2011 than 1971 but this included wards on the outskirts of London and in the city overall.

For the 2011 census the most deprived areas in Britain were parts of Glasgow, Birmingham, Stockton-on-Tees, Redcar and Cleveland, Bradford and Birmingham.

Chris Lloyd, Professor of Quantitative Geography at the University of Liverpool which carried out the study, said: “These findings show just how persistent deprivation is and they also show how concentrations of deprivation in urban areas are actually growing.

“The study shows that the experience of people living in deprived areas can be very different; in some neighbourhoods, high levels of deprivation are all that residents have known while in others a combination of population change within areas and migration into and out of these areas, as well as economic fluctuations, mean that levels of deprivation have increased markedly in recent years.”