Child support and poverty ppt PowerPoint

1. Child poverty &
children’s wellbeing
2 October 2019

2. What’s going on with child poverty?

3. Child poverty is relative
“Individuals, families and groups in the population can be said
to be in poverty when they lack the resources to obtain the
types of diet, participate in the activities, and have the living
conditions and amenities which are customary, or at least
widely encouraged or approved, in the societies to which they
belong. Their resources are so seriously below those
commanded by the average individual or family that they are,
in effect, excluded from ordinary patterns, customs and
activities.”
Peter Townsend (1979) ‘Poverty in the United Kingdom’

4. Child poverty - trend since the 1960s
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5. Compared with the EU
SUB TITLE

6. What does it mean for children?
• Missing out on the joys of childhood.
• Unable to invite friends around for tea or a sleepover.
• Travelling long distances to nursery because the local one
will only let parent have the so-called ‘free’ provision if
they agree to pay ‘top-up’ charges for ‘extras’.
• Stigmatised at school for not having the right uniform – or
wearing a uniform that is shabby or too small.

7. What does it mean for children?
• Unable to make a decent choice for a school lunch
because the £2.30 free school meal allowance won’t
stretch to enough food to fill them up and fuel their brains
for the rest of the day – and they are the lucky ones
because at least they have something.
• Many children growing up in poverty live in families where
parents earn ‘too much’ to qualify but not enough to
afford the cost themselves. Some children get nothing at
all because they live in families who are legitimately living
in the UK with ‘no recourse to public funds’.

8. What does it mean for children?
• Not able to do their homework because there is nowhere
in cramped accommodation they can study – and besides
the teacher set a task researching on the internet and the
family doesn’t have wifi, or even a computer.
• Prevented from developing their musical or artistic talents
because instruments are expensive and classes cost
money the family doesn’t have.
• Missing out on taking part in sports because they can’t
afford the right kit or to get themselves to matches at the
weekend.

9. What does it mean for children?
• Skipping medical appointments because of the cost of transport to
get there – although travel expenses can be claimed for hospital
visits, they have to be paid for first. Car-parking at hospitals has, in
many places, become an unaffordable luxury.
• Going shopping with mum late in the evening to take advantage of
the discounted fresh foods at the end of the day.
• Suffering the humiliation and anxiety of accompanying their parent
to the food bank for emergency supplies because the 5 week wait
for universal credit has become a 7 or 8 week wait.

10. What does it mean for children?
• We have been working with a group of children and young
people in London who were discussing what growing up in
poverty meant to them. To our surprise, they said that the
biggest issue to them was fear of knife crime.
• When asked to explain how this relates to poverty, they
said: “other people can move away from a bad area. We
can’t. When you live in poverty you don’t have choices”.

11. Who is most at risk of poverty?
Children in
single parent
families 49%
Children in
families with
3+ kids 42%
Children in
families with an
under-5 35%
Children in
families where
someone is
disabled 36%
Source: DWP (2018) Households
Below Average Income, 1994/95
– 2016/17.

12. Child poverty is policy responsive
• 1.1m children lifted out of poverty by 2010 – half way to 10%
• Largest reductions in child poverty in OECD between mid-1990s
and 2008 (Bradshaw 2012)
• Child wellbeing improved on 36 out of 48 indicators between
1997 – 2010 (Bradshaw, 2012)
• Deprivation levels fell as did money worries (FACS)
• Extra money led to increased spending on fruit and vegetables,
children’s clothes and books – spending on alcohol and
cigarettes fell (Stewart, 2012)

13. Would have hit target in early 2020s

14. Why is child poverty rising?
• Rising costs – housing and childcare costs
• Low and stagnating wages, slow to rise
• Benefit and tax credit cuts - £21bn per year, plus £12bn more
• By 2021, £40bn per year less social security spending (IFS)
• Around £4bn social security cuts per year still to come
• Pensioners protected – yet children more than three times as
likely to be poor than pensioners (SMC figs)
• 70% hit families with children
• 60% hit working people
• Child poverty act abolished

15. Rising costs and falling incomes
• Cost of a child to 18 – minimum £151k or £183k (LP)
• £161 per week – more as get older
• Couple both full-time on NLW £49 pw short (LPs £74)
• Housing and childcare costs rising
• Growing poverty gap – on average £60 below line
• Extra costs of food in school holidays can push
families from ‘just about managing’ into hardship
• Parents skip meals
• Issue not just about food – holiday hunger is not an
isolated issue
• Indicators of rising child poverty

16. Today, most poor children live with
working parents
In-work poverty (2016/17) - below 60% median (AHC)
1997/98 2016/17
% poor children in working
households 49 67
% poor children in workless
households 51 33
No. poor children in working
households (million) 2.0 2.7
No. poor children in workless
households (million) 2.2 1.3

17. Many working families cannot achieve a
no-frills standard of living
35%
28%
15%
11%
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Single parent with three children, working full
time on the minimum wage
Couple with three children, working full time
on the minimum wage
Single parent with two children working full
time on the median wage
Couple with two children, both working full
time on the minimum wage
Shortfalls from
minimum income
standard
Source: Hirsch, D. The cost of a child in 2018.
http://cpag.org.uk/content/cost-child-2018

18. More devastating cuts in 2015
• 4-year freeze - Child benefit, tax credits and universal credit
• 2-child limit - tax credits or universal credit – from April 2017
• No exception - disabled children or re-partnering
• Benefit cap - reduced to £20k a year (£23k in London) - even if can’t work
due to disability or need to care for young children
• 93% have children, 73% single parents - 75% has child <5 - 28% <2
• Hardest hit - single parents, larger families (3+) and disabled children
• Inflation now projected to rise by 35% 2010-20
• CB will have lost 23% of its 2010 value by 2020

19. Universal credit did not escape
• UC did not escape the axe - similar cuts to tax credits reversed
• Reductions to work allowances (point UC starts to be withdrawn) means
parents now need to work a thirteen-or fourteen-month year just to
protect current income levels
• Originally UC child poverty reducing - 350k, then 150k, now won’t say
• UC failing its own terms (simplicity, work incentives, reducing poverty)

20. The austerity generation: the
impact of a decade of cuts on
family incomes and poverty
Published November 2017

24. We’re all in it together?

25. Why does poverty matter?

26. Income matters
• Family income has a causal relationship with poor child outcomes
• Poorer children have worse:
• Cognitive
• social-behavioural and
• health outcomes
• This is independent of other factors found to be correlated with
child poverty (e.g. household and parental characteristics)
• Most likely mediating factor is parental stress and anxiety
Cooper K & Stewart K (2013) Does money affect children’s outcomes? And update
(2017) York: JRF http://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/dps/case/cp/casepaper203.pdf
and https://www.jrf.org.uk/report/does-money-affect-children%E2%80%99s-outcomes

27. Stealing away children’s life chances
• Education divide – poorer children 9 months behind (Hirsch D,
2007)
• Health divide – socio-economic conditions mean greater risk
heart disease, death by stroke, disability, poor mental health
(Spencer N, 2008)
• Wellbeing divide – neg. impact relationship with parents,
educational orientation, self-worth and risky behaviour
(Tomlinson and Walker, 2009)
• Costs £29 billion a year in public spending (CPAG/Hirsch, D, 2013
building on JRF, 2008 ) – if poverty rises 1m will be £35bn

28. Mechanisms
Two main mechanisms identified:
• ‘Investment’ - parents’ ability to pay for things that help children e.g. healthy
diet, quality housing, extracurricular activities (sports, music etc), computers,
books, bicycles, trips to museums, tuition etc.
• ‘Family stress’ – living on a low income causes stress for parents and raises the
risk of depression and conflict. These in turn affect parenting and negatively
affect children.
Family stress model also supported by other studies e.g.
- Wickham et al. 2017 showed that moving into poverty had large impacts on
mothers’ mental health, which in turn raised the risk of socio-emotional and
behavioural difficulties among children.

29. ‘Parents dilute down milk as they can’t afford formula milk’
‘Children are not accessing services and support due to finances – such as parents can’t take
them on the bus to appointments, etc.’
‘[I see children with] back-to-back respiratory illnesses, living in overcrowded shared
accommodation.’
‘I think that the biggest impact of poverty on the children and parents I encounter is insecurity,
inferiority and stress. Through biological and psychological factors these undoubtedly lead to
poor health.’
‘Constant concern about finances and housing conditions affects families with children with
long-term health conditions; they face difficulty in dealing with treatment as they are
preoccupied with other issues’.
Paediatricians quoted in Poverty and child health: Views from the frontline, CPAG and RCPCH 2017
Doctors’ experiences

30. ‘I work in Early Years and the children ask every morning if they can have food, their mood
and concentration picks up as soon as they eat.’
‘A lot of the times children will have internet access through the phone of a relative,
however, some activities and work are not accessible through these platforms... This then
gives children less of an opportunity to develop.’
‘None of our children in poverty access music lessons as there is no way it can be funded
by parents or school - I know many who would love to.’
‘Parents are in crisis and not managing their children's emotional or physical needs as they
are so stressed about money. The support we need to provide for these families cannot be
underestimated.’
Teachers quoted in Child Poverty and Education: A survey of the experiences of NEU members. CPAG and National
Education Union, April 2018
Teachers’ experiences

31. What can we do to tackle poverty
and improve health and resilience?

32. Child poverty – what needs to happen?
• Need a broad strategy to end child poverty
• Reinstate targets at national and local level
• End freezes - restore family benefits – triple lock?
• £5 on Child Benefit
• Fix UC – so fit for families
• Reform sanctions regime
• DHPs and LWAS – serious need of reform (guarantee
future, ringfence, reporting duties, clear framework
as in Scotland)
• Universal Free School Meals work

33. Examine & reduce the
cost of the school day
• Uniform
• Sports kit
• Trips
• Equipment
• Food
• Clubs
• Fun activities
Poverty and schools
Breakfast, after-school & holiday
clubs
• Improve attainment, help
working parents, include
healthy food
• Available to all children & non-
stigmatised
• Free, at least for low-income
families

34. What can local authorities do?
• Early years & children’s services
• Education & schools
• Employment
• Health
• LA benefits administration
• Welfare rights advice

35. Income maximisation is vital!
• Take up rates of means-tested benefits are
between 56% (JSA) and 86% (child tax credit).
• Many people at foodbanks are there because of a
delay or other benefits problem e.g. sanction.
• Benefits checks and welfare rights advice have
huge returns:
• Since 2010 CPAG advisers have restored
£4.2m to clients of 1 foodbank through
welfare rights advice.
• Benefits advice delivered in 6 schools in
Edinburgh won £350,000 for families in 1 year.
• Benefits check should be a first step in early
intervention with families. Source: Evaluation of CPAG advice project in
First Love foodbank, Tower Hamlets

36. Local welfare assistance best practices
Emergency support
• Grants not loans wherever possible
• Cash rather than in-kind or vouchers
• Well-advertised
• Simple & dignified application process
• Sufficiently resourced
• Appeal rights
Council tax reduction
• No minimum payments for the poorest (won’t increase collection anyway)
• End bailiff use and aggressive debt recovery for council tax debt
• Negotiate with families to keep them out of court
• No ‘two-child limit’
(See ‘Still too poor to pay’, CPAG and Zacchaeus 2000 Trust, 2017)
Discretionary housing payments
• Offer as much security to families as possible on duration of payments

37. Schools, extended schools & early years
• High quality early childhood education & care
• Promote take-up of free early years entitlements – where paid
for, look at payment processes
• Address childcare needs of parents of children with special needs
• Sure Start Children’s Centres – protect and revive
• Extended schools – breakfast, after school and holiday childcare
(not child feeding stations) – work-friendly hours
• Equal access to enriching activities
• Free School Meals – extend to universal where possible
• Beware ‘voluntary’ parental contributions & charges for materials
and activities

38. Extended schools not feeding stations for the poor
• Parents – valued activities not association with food element
• Pressure, guilt, lack of confidence
• Cost pressures for activities and clothes & no FSMs in hols
• Hard to find or afford holiday childcare (waiting lists, teenagers,
special needs, unhelpful hours)
• Wanted free, healthy meals within existing provision
• Extended schools known and trusted – enriching activities
• Improve attainment, socially inclusive, food integral part of service
• Need comprehensive extended school services, not child feeding
stations for ‘the poor’
Our reports – Unfinished Business, Cost of the school day

39. Support parental employment
• It takes at least 1.5 workers for average family to
escape poverty
• Use leverage with local employers – living wage but
not living hours
• Training programmes tailored to needs of local job
market
• Look beyond entry-level work to in-work progression

40. Policies to focus on
• Advice – welfare rights advice is early intervention
• Brings cash into local economy
• Support with UC
• Good use of DHPs and don’t pass on 10% CT cut
• Local Welfare Assistance Schemes
• Provide local support for parental employment
• Debt and credit advice
• Housing and homelessness prevention – local solutions
• Child mental health services – prioritise and develop
• Community transport – free for children & young people?
• Unlock sports facilities and community assets
• Food poverty - food deserts & food banks

41. More policies to focus on
• Council tax reductions schemes - good use of DHPs
• Debt and credit advice
• Housing quality and homelessness prevention – local
solutions
• Change of tenancy arrangements – refurbishment,
furniture, UC friendly dates
• Community transport – free for children & young people?
• Unlock sports facilities and community assets –
discounted/free sessions
• Libraries
• Planning – no fast food near schools?
• Green spaces – community growing

42. The end