The Reality of Child Poverty in the UK
Child poverty in this country has become a fact of life: ‘too big to tackle, and too familiar to notice’. There are 4.2 million children growing up in poverty, which equates to nine children in a class of 30 going out with things they need for the happy, full, and secure childhood that all children deserve. Over the last decade, there has been little progress in reducing this figure, and families tell us that the experience of raising children during the cost-of-living crisis is getting even tougher.
But poverty does not have to be a fact of life. In New Zealand, the child poverty rate fell from 23% to 15% in four years. In Ireland, the child poverty rate is almost half the rate in the UK, at 13.6%. There are 20 OECD countries with child poverty rates lower than the UK’s, including France, Germany, and Poland. Other governments, in other countries, accept and take responsibility for child poverty, and have seen success in reducing it.
We have lessons to learn in poverty reduction from other countries, but we also have our own successes learn from. While child poverty has remained relatively static, pensioner poverty has almost halved over the last 25 years, going from 28% in 1994 to 15% in 2021. The triple lock in state pensions has meant a steady increase to pensioners’ incomes since 2012, and a near-halving of pensioner poverty over 20 years.
Over the same period where pensioners saw an increase in state spending of £11 billion per year, money that flows towards families and children has seen a cut of 17% between 2010 and 2020.
The welfare state is supposed to support people ‘from the cradle to the grave’, but for too long, too little attention has been paid to the cradle.
The need for a ‘child lock’
The UK Government should ‘double lock’ spending on children’s social security entitlements, so that money that goes to children increases by earnings, or by inflation if inflation is higher than earnings. This will ensure that children are better protected during periods of high inflation and benefit during periods of growth. Growth must be shared, and it is not right that some of the country’s poorest children could miss out on the benefits of growth, just because their parents do not happen to be the ones seeing earnings increases.
A child lock would represent an investment in our collective future and would also be an effective way of reducing inequalities and enabling inclusive growth. All children’s benefits, including child benefit should be guaranteed under this ‘child lock’. This will mean that a vast majority of families can share in the benefits of this child lock. Beyond social security
A child lock does not only have to apply to social security. A lock in education spending could help to ensure that school budgets do not see the decimation they experienced during the 2010s. The lock could also apply to other services and support accessed by children. A lock in mental health provision could provide some guarantees around CAMHS and seek to mitigate the impact of sanctions on families’ wellbeing, and a lock in housing policy could provide some assurances to families with regards to evictions, local housing allowance, and the quality of social housing.
Next Steps
We will be publishing a series of papers, exploring what a child lock could look like in more detail: thinking about services for children, education, social security spending, mental health, and housing policy. These focuses are based on what families we work with have told us is important to them, and we will be working closely with our parent and youth panels, as well as policy experts from across these sectors, to help shape this work.
Save the Children has a vision for a UK where children can grow up with a greater sense of security – where opportunities for play, growth, and development don’t have to be accompanied by their parents cutting back elsewhere. Where child poverty is seen as something that is worth tackling, and that can be overcome. A child lock is a critical step towards that vision.
If you would like to know more, please read our full briefing here.
Contact Meghan: [email protected]
