And finally…’Orkney best place to raise children in Scotland’, says Bank of Scotland

The survey looks at a number of factors including primary school class size, high school spending per pupil, low population density and traffic.

What makes Orkney the best place to bring up children?

Shetland and Western Isles round off the top three for the second year running.

Both Shetland and Western Isles scored similar exam results (91.6% and 90.3%) and average school spend per pupil (£8,844 and £9,095) compared to Orkney.

Shetland has the highest employment rate in Scotland with 89.1%, compared to the national average of 75.2%. Shetland also benefits from a low secondary school pupil to teacher ratio of 13.2, compared to British average of 20.9. The highest secondary school pupil to teacher ratio in Scotland is in East Renfrewshire (20.0).

The Western Isles has the lowest population density per square kilometre of 9, with the national average being 276. Western Isles also has by far the lowest traffic flow in Scotland with only 71 cars per square kilometre compared to the British average of 9,587. They also have the lowest primary school class size of 17.0.

Interestingly, Orkney (56.49%), Shetland (55.82%) and Western Isles (51.99%) are all significantly below the British average of 86% for access to fast broadband.

Nitesh Patel, economist at Bank of Scotland said: “The north of Scotland has always done well when we’ve done this research so it’s no surprise that Orkney, the Shetland Islands and Western Isles remain the top three in the 2016 Bank of Scotland Children’s Quality of Life Index, across both Scotland and Great Britain. Children in these areas benefit from low primary school class sizes, low pupil to teacher ratio in secondary schools, excellent exam results and some of the highest school spend per pupil.”