Scot Hunter

This isn’t about individual choices, it’s about the environments people live in, the opportunities they have, and the support systems around them.

source: www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopula...

This isn't just a statistic, it's people's family members dying before they should, and all the pain that comes with that. It's also a reflection of deep-seated structural issues.

In the most deprived parts of England, there were an expected 569 early deaths for every 100,00 people. The (unweighted) average in England was 446.

The latest figures released yesterday on premature mortality in England and Wales reveal another stark and persistent inequality: From March 2021 to December 2023, people living in the most deprived areas were 64% more likely to die prematurely than those in the least deprived places.

The data shows a clear and growing trend: inequality is deepening, and it’s costing people not just years of life, but years of quality life. This growing disparity highlights the urgency of addressing the social and economic factors that continue to shape unequal health outcomes across the country

‼️ That's a nearly 20-year gap, not in lifespan, but in the number of years lived in good health‼️

With the state pension age now at 66 (and rising), many people in the most deprived areas are spending their final working years in poor health, or not living long enough to enjoy retirement at all.

Between 2020 and 2022, men and women born in the most deprived areas could expect to live just 51.1 and 50.5 years in good health, respectively.

In contrast, those in the least deprived areas could expect over 70 years of healthy life.

🚨 New data from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) reveals a stark and persistent truth: in England, the place you're born still plays a major role in determining how well (and how long) you live.

Bar chart titled "Healthy life expectancy at birth, by sex and deprivation level (IMD decile), England". The chart compares healthy life expectancy for men (dark blue bars) and women (light green bars) across ten deprivation deciles, from most deprived (Decile 1) to least deprived (Decile 10), based on the Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD). In Decile 1 (most deprived), healthy life expectancy is approximately 51.1 years for men and 50.5 years for women. In Decile 10 (least deprived), it rises to about 70.1 years for men and 70.2 years for women. The chart shows a clear upward trend in healthy life expectancy as deprivation decreases, with a nearly 20-year gap between the most and least deprived groups. Source: Office for National Statistics (ONS), 2020–2022 data.

Photo of criminologists Dr Ashley Rogers, Dr Hannah Graham, and Dr Diana Miranda in graduation gowns and smiling.

Photo of Prof Peter Matthews and Dr Niall Hamilton-Smith, with Dr Ben Matthews in the background, all wearing graduation gowns at a University of Stirling graduation.

Photo of Dr Marina Shapira wearing her graduation gowns and cap, smiling.

Congratulations to our students who graduated @stir.ac.uk 👏💐🎓🎉

Hooray for Dr Beth Cairns, Dr @scothunter.bsky.social, & Dr Jade Hooper getting PhDs!

📸 Academics:
@niallhsmith.bsky.social @urbaneprofessor.bsky.social @dianamiranda.bsky.social @drashleyrogers.bsky.social @drhannahgraham.bsky.social

1 in 6 children in Wales has been in poverty in 3 out of the last 4 years.

🚨 Urgent, radical action from the Welsh and UK governments is needed to avoid lasting consequences.

Our report out today with the Bevan Foundation lays bare the state of poverty in Wales in 2025.

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Map showing proportion of working age population in receipt of health related social security, coloured by quintile of constituency. In some coastal areas, south Wales, the North West and Yorkshire and North East, rates are between 15-20%

Where will the cuts to sickness & disability benefits hit hardest?

New @jrf-uk.bsky.social constituency analysis shows the % of working age people receiving these benefits in England & Wales.

Some MP inboxes are likely to be brimming, as concern about these plans is widespread

You would kind of hope that the Jobcentre might know where to find workers to fill its own vacancies really wouldn't you?

Line chart showing the trend in relative child poverty (AHC) and the child poverty reduction targets. It shows one-year estimates with large confidence intervals. The rate in 2023/24 is 22% and the interim target (also 2023/24) is 18%. In 2030/31 the final target is 10%.

Today’s poverty statistics show that the Scottish Government has failed to meet the interim child poverty reduction targets.

240,000 children is Scotland remain in poverty (AHC). To have met the targets a further 40,000 children would need to have been lifted out of poverty.

All ethnic minority groups in the UK continue to face persistent poverty with no signs of improvement from last year.

📊 New DWP figures show people in Bangladeshi households are still 3x more likely to be in poverty compared to white households, and Pakistani households are 2.5x more likely.

New poverty rate figures show the West Midlands, London and the North West had the highest child poverty rates with over a third of children in poverty.

In Scotland (where things are being done differently) the child poverty rate is joint lowest for the UK at 23%.

Around 4.5 million children are living in relative poverty after housing costs. 200,000 more since before the pandemic.

These are record numbers of children living in poverty.

Latest DWP figures on Households Below Average Income has found 🔽 1/3

The public’s surprising choice of tax increase, and why we should ignore it Gabriel Milland of Portland Communications has published polling conducted by the Portland research team in early October. Gabriel takes some interesting political conclusions from the polling (and I’...

Seeing as we are barrelling towards A Major Fiscal Event I'm reposting some polling I recently did for @danneidle.bsky.social on the profound lack of understanding the public have about tax and spending.

taxpolicy.org.uk/2024/10/26/t...

The Chancellor said today that she would not do anything to put household finances in danger

Yet the government’s own assessment shows their cuts to health related benefits risk pushing 250,000 people into poverty, including 50,000 children 📢

Their assessment also found... 1/3

Yesterday, the Government’s launched the #PathwaystoWork green paper. It plans to create a “clearer youth phase” by changing benefit rules for young people to support its new Youth Guarantee.

Key takeaways 🧵1/7

Stacked bar chart showing that the vast majority of the forecast increase in caseload and expenditure on PIP is from recipients in receipt of both elements (80% of caseload growth, 89% of spend growth) or one at the enhanced rate (increases to 84% of caseload growth, 92% of spend growth).

@jrf-uk.bsky.social has analysed caseload data and can see much of the forecast growth in PIP spending is directed at people with significant difficulties across a range of areas. Over half of the growth in spending is from people in receipt of the higher rate in both PIP elements.

Very pleased to have a part in this

And that's it - the Final Report for LGBT+ Welfare and Assets in Great Britain published.

Many thanks to @nuffieldfoundation.org for funding this research. To our knowledge, nothing of this scale has ever been done in the UK:
lgbtqwelfare.stir.ac.uk

Crying at the conference

My first ever 'fresh off the press' type post 📃 (!), thrilled that our first peer-reviewed article from our @britishacademy.bsky.social funded research on the intentions to stay of young people in Armenia 🇦🇲 has been published in Diaspora (@uoftpress.bsky.social). utppublishing.com/doi/10.3138/...

@philippac.bsky.social

Wee jaunt to University of Stirling for a super useful and informative weights workshop delivered by Pierre Walthery from the UK Data Service. Cheers @kateohara.bsky.social for organising through the Large Social Surveys group (time to make a blue sky account so I can tag you pls).

Student I was counting on to nod throughout the lecture stopped nodding

I wish I had seen this sooner, I chickened out of making all my lecture slides in lowercase Arial on a lime green background attempting in an attempt to get SOME student engagement x