[UK] Church campaigners say government can be bolder on child poverty

from Ekklesia

The government is expected to today announce that is has missed its target of cutting child poverty by a quarter in its first two terms.

The announcement will come as no surprise to church campaigners who predicted last year that the government would fail to meet its targets on child poverty, and that greater political will was required to close the gap between rich and poor.

The work and welfare secretary, John Hutton, is expected to respond today by promising the government will work even harder to meet its next, more challenging target of halving child poverty by 2010.

Mr Hutton will also promise "a new drive against social exclusion", saying the solution lies not just in improving tax credits, but in helping more single parents and disabled people into work through welfare reform programmes. He will also say better public services, based around choice, can reduce poverty.

Church Action on Poverty is amongst those who have warned that achieving the goal of ending child poverty in a generation would "require much greater political will and injection of resources to narrow the gap between the poorest and the rest of society.”

They have urged that the same political will that accompanied the Make Poverty History campaign aimed at the developing world, be found to tackle poverty in the UK.

In the run up to last year's general election, the Prime Minister insisted that the Government was on target to meet its targets. Tony Blair told a gathering of Christians; "We cannot call ourselves a fair or strong society until every one of our children, whatever their background, gets the chance to make the most of themselves, to lead a fulfilled life, to feel they are participating members of our community."

The government promised to cut child poverty by a quarter between 1998-99 and 2004-05. It intends to halve child poverty by 2010-11. Child poverty is defined as children living in households earning less than 60% of median income.

By 2003-04, child poverty had fallen by 15%, or 600,000, since 1998-99.

Niall Cooper from Church Action on Poverty told Ekklesia; "The picture is mixed. If the government have missed their target, that is to be regretted. The reality though is that they have not missed it by much.

"But the challenge of getting from a cut in child poverty of a quarter to a half is a much bigger hurdle" he warned.

However, Cooper suggested that recent events meant that the Government could now be much bolder in its efforts.

"With Conservative leader David Cameron and the new leader of the Liberal Democrats Menzies Campbell both now focusing on issues of poverty, the opportunities are there for the government to be much bolder" he said.