Aileen Campbell, SNP MSP for South of Scotland, has expressed her concern at a new report which has found former coalmining areas in South Lanarkshire are disproportionately affected by poverty and deprivation compared with other parts of the country.

The report, commissioned to mark ten years of the Coalfields Regeneration Trust, found that in the five wards in South Lanarkshire, which are eligible for support from the trust (including three of the four Clydesdale wards), 32% of the datazones were amongst the poorest 20% in Scotland as a whole. The report found that among all former coalmining communities 28% of the datazones were among the worst 20% in Scotland, compared to 19% in other areas of Scotland. The findings led the report to conclude that:

"there is much unfinished business in coalfield communities. Deprivation in Scotland is still disproportionately concentrated in coalfield communities. The economic recovery in coalfield communities is also still at best fragile and will be tested by the current recession."

The report did also find that the Coalfields Regeneration Trust has had a positive effect on areas where it has invested and supported community projects. Projects in South Lanarkshire received a total of £23,607 funding from the Trust between April 2008 and November 2009.

Commenting, Aileen Campbell MSP said:

"Many people and communities in Clydesdale have benefited from the work of the Coalfields Regeneration Trust, but as this report shows, there is still a lot of work left to do.

"The legacy of the destruction of our coalmining industry during the Thatcher years still casts a shadow over many parts of rural Clydesdale and the South of Scotland as a whole.

"The Scottish Government has pledged to continue supporting the work of the Coalfields Regeneration Trust in helping communities tackle decline and deprivation, and I hope that everyone will play their part to end the scandal of poverty in modern Scotland."