Ordeal of children in poverty

from the Manchester Evening News

Chris Osuh

INNER city Manchester is home to the poorest children in the country.

New figures reveal that more families are on the breadline in the Manchester Central constituency than anywhere else.

A total of 52 per cent of children in Ancoats and Clayton, Ardwick, Bradford, the city centre, Hulme, Moss Side, Miles Platting, Newton Heath and Whalley Range live in homes dependent on benefits, the figures reveal.

The researchers from charity End Child Poverty defined poor families as those dependent on benefits in the year up to April 2006.

The statistics shows a drop of two per cent on Manchester's poverty total when compared with figures released in January.

The results are broken down further using council ward boundaries to reveal that the poorest children in Greater Manchester live in Moss Side.

In the south Manchester neighbourhood, 61 per cent of families are officially on the breadline.

This makes Moss Side the seventh poorest community in the country. Harpurhey, Hulme and Blackfriars in Salford were also in the top 20, with well over 50 per cent of families dependent on benefits.

In contrast, Altrincham and Sale are two of the most affluent areas in the country, with only 10 per cent of children living in poverty.

Niall Cooper, of the Manchester-based national charity, Church Action on Poverty, said: "Poorer families need to get access to better paid jobs and we would also support the idea of a `living wage' which is higher than the minimum wage."

He added: "Manchester in particular has a high reliance on doorstep lending which can lead struggling families struggling into a cycle of debt."

MP Tony Lloyd told the M.E.N. he had been in talks with the Treasury about the issue. He said: "We know Manchester Central has long been one of the poorest parts of Britain. In the Seventies and Eighties, the area was devastated by unemployment and child poverty has come out of this."

Mr Lloyd said that the government had invested billions in helping the poorest through schemes like tax credits, as well as introduced a minimum wage.

Nearly three million children live in poverty nationwide and the government is setting up a unit to half the rate by 2010.

Laura Payne, of End Child Poverty, said the figures were an `underestimate' of the problem because it was based only on statistics for families dependent on benefits.

She added: "It's essential for the government to keep its promise to millions of children across the country bymaking a sizeable investment."