ScotlandCounted

6 questions · about 90 seconds

Guess the figure

These are official, published figures about the country you live in. Almost nobody gets them right, and the gap between what people assume and what is true is the whole problem.

Glasgow

1/6

How many of Glasgow's children are growing up in poverty?

Why guess at all

Being wrong about this is the normal response

People consistently underestimate how bad these numbers are, and that is not stupidity. The figures are published, but they sit in spreadsheets, behind words like “equivalised” and “after housing costs”, and nobody ever says them out loud in ordinary language.

That matters, because pressure follows attention. A figure nobody knows cannot embarrass anyone. Every answer here links to the page where the same number is shown with the organisation that published it, so you can check any of it rather than take my word.

Where the answers come from

Local child poverty estimates after housing costs, 2015–2024

End Child Poverty / Loughborough University

Child poverty rates and counts for Glasgow and all 32 Scottish council areas.
Poverty and Income Inequality in Scotland 2022–25

Scottish Government

The Scotland-wide headline poverty rates for all people, children, working-age adults and pensioners, and the share of children in poverty living in a working household.
Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan progress report 2024–25

Scottish Government

Outturns against the four statutory interim targets in the Child Poverty (Scotland) Act 2017.
National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage rates

UK Government

The legal hourly minimums from 1 April 2026: £12.71 for workers aged 21 and over, £10.85 for ages 18–20, and £8 for under-18s and eligible apprentices.
Scottish Income Tax: rates and bands, 2026 to 2027

Scottish Government

The bands used to work out take-home pay: a £12,570 personal allowance, then 19% to £16,537, 20% to £29,526 and 21% to £43,662.
Council Tax by band 2025-26, council tax datasets

Scottish Government

Glasgow City council tax by band: £1,074 at Band A and £1,611 at Band D in 2025-26.

Nothing in the quiz is written for effect. Every figure appears elsewhere on this site with its working shown — if you think one is wrong, tell me and I will correct it publicly.

Now put one of those numbers to the person who decides it

Enter your postcode. I find your MP and MSP, add the figures for your own area and write both emails. You read them and press send.