Child poverty is becoming the ?new normal' in parts of Britain as fastest rises in poverty hit the poorest areas.
The UK's leading child poverty coalition is calling for the UK's major Parties to outline ambitious child poverty-reduction strategies as new data published today shows that child poverty is becoming the norm in some parts of Britain, with more than 50% of children living trapped in poverty in some constituencies.
Anna Feuchtwang, Chair of the End Child Poverty coalition, said: "We know what causes child poverty and we know how to end it. We know that the income of less well-off families has been hit by severe real-terms cuts in benefits and by higher housing costs. And we know that work alone does not guarantee a route out of poverty, with two thirds of child poverty occurring in working families."
End Child Poverty is calling for Government to set out an ambitious and credible child poverty-reduction strategy, including:
- Restoring the link between benefits (including housing support) and inflation, and then making up for the loss in the real value in children's benefits as a result of the 4-year freeze and previous sub-inflation increases in benefit rates.
- Ending the two-child limit on child allowances in tax credits and universal credit-and reforming Universal Credit;
- Reversing the cuts and investing in children's services such as mental health, education, childcare and social care.
Locally, there are 29,192 children living in Barking and Dagenham, 43 percent of which are living in poverty. In Havering there are 16,226 children, 26 percent of which are living in poverty.
Jon Cruddas MP said: "The new figures are a chilling example of how austerity is affecting children in our communities. These statistics are a damning indictment of an out of touch government implementing out of touch policies over the past nine years."