The number of families who have become dependent on food banks in Scotland is a damning indictment of 14 failed years of Conservative government.

As the Tories have taken a ­sledgehammer to the welfare state, ­charities and third sector organisations have increasingly had to step in to help those most in need.

Gordon Brown estimates that as many as 100,000 children in Scotland do not have a bed of their own to sleep on, while 300,000 are missing out on at least one meal per day.

Food banks themselves have boomed, with one in 2010 now at almost 200. The scale of child poverty in a nation with so much wealth is a scandal and one which the Record has repeatedly highlighted over the last 14 years.

As most welfare powers are reserved, we must look to an incoming Labour government to bring........

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