UofG Centre for Public Policy

START Lightning Talk by Adam Lang, Director of Policy at Carnegie UK 

Statistically, my children are more likely to grow up poorer than I did and with less means and less opportunity than I had. This is, in part, the fault of all of us in this room today that say we are progressive public policy professionals. 

So before I anger everyone too much, let me explain why I think this is. At its root, this is a systemic problem about how we measure and define public policy success.  

In Scotland today, we are very good at talking about what matters. We are much less good at measuring it. And even worse at letting those measurements genuinely shape and inform our decision making. Until we fix this, our public policy ambition will remain little more than political theatre.

In this country we often view ourselves as policy pioneers. We have the National Performance Framework, ambitious targets to tackle poverty and progressive laws on rights. But if our metrics were really working to drive decisions, would our social and economic progress be stalling and stagnating as it is?

We are seeing deepening and compounding structural inequalities across our society. While we have mastered the art of hitting KPIs and publishing strategies – we are doing so while delivering a system that isn't actually making us healthier, wealthier or more equal.

Consider the most haunting statistic in Scottish policy today: the Healthy Life Expectancy gap. Those in our least deprived areas can expect 25 more years of good health than those in the most deprived. A quarter-century difference in good health - a moral indictment on us all. 

What is at the heart of all this? Well to be sure, these are complex and wicked social policy challenges. But as the economist Joseph Stiglitz put it: 'If we measure the wrong thing, we will do the wrong thing'.  

Today, we are world-class at measuring the cost of social policy failure, but too often appear disconnected or even illiterate when it comes to measuring the value of early intervention, prevention or long-term investment.

So my challenge to everyone is this: let’s stop being policy accountants and start being policy architects. Let's be radical.

This University has a proud history of radical thinking. Adam Smith himself (the second most famous graduate from here named Adam) knew that an economy without a social soul is a hollow machine.

Let us be radical in how we measure success to embrace our social soul. Because what we measure is not neutral; it is the manifestation of our policy choices. It decides what gets funded and what gets ignored, who gets praised and what gets blamed. 

And to be clear, this is not easy. It is not fluffy. It is not a 'nice to have'. It is essential, it is difficult (but not impossible) and it is at the core of good policy governance that’s focussed on what matters to people.

If we cannot design measures and actions to tangibly improve people’s lives, then we risk becoming the most statistically well-documented, declining nation in history.

But there is hope and there is opportunity. For example, with the National Performance Framework, Scotland was pioneering in putting in place measurements to guide policy making across government siloes. This was enshrined in statute in direct response to the work of economists like Jospeh Stiglitz.

But nearly two decades on from it being introduced, Scotland is still not using that framework and the data it measures in ways that drive decision making and improve lives. To drive and shape policy responses.

We must do better. 

We can do better. For example, at Carnegie UK our own Life in the UK index shows that it is possible to design a comprehensive suite of indicators to understand how people are living and use this to inform policy priorities.

So we need to start measuring success differently. By measuring the things that make life worth living and prioritising them for proactive policy intervention.

This is how we will ensure that my children and everyone else's, get to grow up in a world where they have more, not less, success, equality and opportunity.

Author and about this blog

Adam leads Carnegie UK’s policy team and oversees the organisations work with partners across the UK and Ireland. As part of Carnegie UK’s leadership team, Adam contributes to wider organisational strategic development and delivery. Adam was previously the Head of Nesta Scotland, the UK’s innovation agency for social good and before that he was Head of Policy and Communications for Shelter Scotland. Adam was a member of the SCVO Board of Trustees for six years between 2017 and 2023 and sat on the Data Driven Innovation (DDI) Advisory Board at the University of Edinburgh between 2020 and 2023. Adam was a member of the Scottish Government Steering Group that helped develop Scotland’s first AI strategy in 2021. Adam currently sits on the Advisory Board for the Scottish Health Equity Research Unit (SHERU) at the University of Strathclyde and is a guest lecturer at the University of Glasgow’s school of social sciences on social policy, data and democracy issues.  

START Lightning Talk by Adam Lang, Director of Policy at Carnegie UK 

This is a written copy of a talk that was delivered at the University of Glasgow Centre for Public Policy’s event Stop/Start: Making Public Service Reform Stick in Scotland, on Monday 19 January 2026.  

It was part of a set of START talks, quick fire provocations from leaders in this space, focused on what works and what we should be doing more of, drawing on real success stories. 

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First published: 11 February 2026