Low-income voters ‘key battleground for general election’

Low-income voters in Scotland could be crucial in determining whether Labour or the Tories win the next general election, a think tank has suggested.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) claimed the major parties must “reboot” their policy offerings to this group in a bid to boost support.

It said, however, that moving further to the left was “unlikely to solve Labour’s problems” in Scotland.

The think tank argued Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn’s parties both need to increase their backing among poorer Scots if they want the keys to Number 10.

Meanwhile, if Nicola Sturgeon’s party can “galavanise” support in this group, it said the SNP could hold the balance of power.

In a report looking at the results of the 2015 and 2017 elections, as well as the 2014 independence referendum and the Brexit vote in 2016, research for the think tank said low-income voters “are increasingly a key battleground in Scottish and British politics”.

Claire Ainsley, JRF executive director, said: “With British politics on a knifeedge and the main parties unable to secure a majority, how low-income households vote at the next general election could pave the road to Number 10. Yet political debate is fixated on Brexit at a time when millions of families are locked in poverty and struggling to make end meets.”