Hughes enlists directors in fight to end child poverty.

from Community Care, UK

This article covers a children's serivces conference in the UK that addressed child poverty. - Kale

Directors should ensure that early intervention and child poverty are priorities, says minister

by Daniel Lombard

Children's minister Beverley Hughes last week urged directors of children's services to play a lead role in harnessing local support for the government's campaign to eradicate child poverty by 2020.

Hughes told the Association of Directors of Children's Services annual conference that directors should forge partnerships with local authority and primary care trust senior managers to ensure they prioritised child poverty and a "shift to early intervention" in children's services. She said this should be reflected in funding contributions from agencies.

The theme of last week's conference in Manchester was combating family poverty.

Hughes admitted the latest statistics on child poverty, which showed an increase of 100,000 between 2005-6 and 2006-7, were a cause of "great sadness and frustration".

But she said services were well-placed to make inroads over the next 10 years towards the government's target of halving child poverty by 2010 (at 1999 levels) and eradicating it by 2020.

ADCS president Maggie Atkinson backed Hughes' call for directors to challenge partner bodies.

In a separate debate, the chair of the ADCS workforce development committee said councils could tackle child poverty by helping their own low-paid workers and providing job opportunities for unemployed parents.