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Summary: A pre-budget briefing note on the Chancellor's
recommendations towards addressing child
poverty in the UK.
Will the Chancellor’s Budget deliver for Britain’s million poorest children?
The budget this week is expected to continue the Government’s strategy
which has been to tackle child poverty by raising the rewards for work and
helping more people into work. This has produced significant reductions in
child poverty from the very high rates which the Labour Government
inherited in 1997.
However, Save the Children believes that we are reaching the limits to
which child poverty can be reduced using these means alone as there are
a large number of children whose parents, for a variety of reasons, are
unable to work full time or in stable year-round employment.This can be
due to difficult family circumstances such as illness or disability. Parents
may be ill or disabled themselves. They may have care responsibilities for ill
or disabled children or elderly relatives, which prevent them from working
full-time, or at all.
For those who can, and do work, many jobs can be either short-term,
seasonal or insecure and cannot provide the stability of income needed to
provide for children throughout the year. Welfare to work policies alone will
not address the needs of Britain’s million poorest children who suffer most
from social exclusion, lack of opportunity and other effects of growing up in
severe and persistent poverty.
Save the Children believes that the Government’s current action to tackle
child poverty needs to be expanded to increase support for families
without a full time earner. The Chancellor should announce a new Minimum
Income Commission for families which will calculate the cost to parents of
providing the basic needs for their children. This would include items such
as a warm waterproof coat, new well-fitting shoes when they are needed
and a well heated bedroom. The Chancellor should then ensure that no
family’s income falls below this agreed level. Without action to address the
needs of Britain’s poorest children, neither the target of halving child
poverty by 2010, nor eradicating it in a generation will be met.
Government policy is that “The best route out of poverty is through work.”
This is true for many, but for those who cannot escape poverty through
work alone, another route out of poverty needs to be provided.
A Statement from Save the Children in response to the budget will be
released shortly after the Chancellor completes his speech on Wednesday.