How would you tackle child poverty and improve outcomes?

[Cindyyyy]

I would back:

• free basic school meals for all from 3 (extras can be paid for) of healthy, veg-based, minimally-processed meals
• investment into school-based pre-school, to be free for all from age 3
• increase school funding massively, pay rises for teachers and nursery staff, investment and subsidies into training
• increase number of SEN schools and in-school SEN provision, as well as PRUs
• subsidised holiday clubs for all parents working full time
• extend SureStart, increase reviews by health visitors. If a child isn’t meeting milestones, earlier intervention and increased checks
• expand apprenticeships

You?

It's ina country interests to have an educated population, it benefits society, we don't need to reduce the intellectual capacity of society even further.

While I don’t disagree with you, looking at the educational standard of some people coming out of universities I would question whether it’s been a good use of anyone’s time or money in some instances.

@harriet9955,I would agree that government should build more council houses but they don't do they. I don't stop them building them. I don't make or force tenants to rent any of my 12 houses. In fact I've got a waiting list for people wanting to rent them. That's because I'm a good landlord who organised any repairs and maintenance quickly and replaces broken white goods often the next day. I'm simply providing a service where there is a need for one. Do you think garages that lease cars and have hundreds to lease are greedy too? Or shops that sell lots of food like Tesco are greedy too? Or, is it just Landlords you hate so much? I'm not stopping anyone buying their own house or forcing anyone to let from me.

Yeah back at you 🫤

No one has the right to have a child. Being a parent is not a right. Being a parent is a privilege and if you can't financially afford that privilege then you don't get to have children.

And yes, yes I know that in certain circumstances, the financial lives of some parents can change overnight etc. But that doesn't mean that we should allow millions of other parents to still blithely go ahead and have children that the State then has to financially support.

It is you who is disillusioned or disingenuous who knows. In the last 40 years the number of multi-millionaires in the UK has risen exponentially! Forty years ago there were fewer than 100,000 millionaires in the UK and the number of people with wealth above £5 million was miniscule. In 2024 that figure had risen to approximately 3 million millionaires. Even with this 'exodus' the absolute number is still vastly higher than it was 40 years ago, this is why we see such huge wealth inequality, the richest 1 % of the UK hold 70% of the wealth. we are not discussing middle/working class people on £100000 as well you probably know!

What do you suggest we do about it? Sew up their private parts?

I am not just talking about men.

We need children to continue a functioning society both economically and physically. Quite apart from the biological desire to have them - in some cases which is not abnormal or strange for goodness sake!

You do realise that a 3 bed semi in the SE of England can cost nearly a million? Being a millionaire and being a house-owner in these areas is often the same thing. It does not mean people have an income anywhere near 100k, or are particularly cash-rich.

I speak as someone who’s always worked in the public sector and never earned anywhere even approaching that sum.

And school holidays, sick pay and amazing pension vs working in a supermarket

It’s interesting to see so many posts on here (typically a more left leaning site) about people taking responsibility, welfare dependence being a problem etc.

this should be a wake up for Labour - the people funding everything through their taxes are fed up. Working people don’t get a pay rise when they have another kid. In a country with free contraception and more or less abortion on demand there is no reason to have kids you can’t afford or care for.

Er yes, I live in the south east and fall in that bracket. I'm referring to multi millionaires not people with an asset of a million pound house although depending on your age i.e. not a windfall, you are categorically wealthy at those prices.

I mean, speak for yourself, I'd rather a Labour government than a extreme right wing one!

@Goldenbear I'm probably close to being a theoretical millionaire because I own the house that DS and I live in.

I'm a single mum. I don't have any money, it just means I bought a very ordinary house a long time ago. We live in it. We could sell it but then we'd be homeless.

A new-built shoebox semi in our town costs £900k. I have a budget of £60 a week to feed both of us. We haven't turned the heating on yet. I'm still working full time in my 60s.

Maybe adjust your views of the "rich" to take house prices into account.

Kudos do you (I mean this sincerely and not patronisingly)

Honestly, change the law and make all fathers pay up and automatic deductions from their wages and no benefits from them whatsoever if they do not pay.

So when someone CHOOSES to have a child whose responsibility is it to bring up that child?

Also educate parents how to be good parents. Educational outcomes are largely due to parenting I am afraid, school is only part of the picture. If the parent is not going to make time to read and talk to their child from an early age you are on a trajectory to nowhere. They will enter school year behind already and likely will never catch up. You cannot have a system that keeps rewarding shitty parents, it is already that way. Teachers are already having to make time constantly in primary for the parents who refuse to read with their kids and do nothing at home, at the cost of other children. SEND needs intervention, yes, but rewarding shitty parenting is not a good idea. I think better to channel funds away from crappy parents and apply them to clubs and food for the kids directly.

@Goldenbear You cannot fail to notice the government wants more apprenticeships in trades. We don’t necessarily need graduates. Some degrees are not leading to graduate jobs and around 20% of graduates could not get graduate work since Covid.

There is now a much bigger issue where graduate vacancies are down 33%. Where is that going to lead - except to more disillusionment? At the same time many building trades are difficult to source. We have a mismatch. Not that unemployed grads will get on trades courses, they are severely underfunded and scarce. The 37% at university take the lions share of the FE/HE money - but where has that got us? Yes we need an educated workforce but also a skilled one. Too many poor value degrees lead to neither.

I know all that, see above, the data was to give people in an insight into the vast differences to 40 years ago. Actually, the most shocking figure of 1% of the population owning 70% of UK wealth is the reason that we have wealth inequality akin to the Victorian era. If people could just be a little less greedy then perhaps we could have less poverty - just a thought.

I think people have just had enough haven't they. They are just sick of funding everything for everyone else whilst barely being able to get by themselves. I've worked for forty years through some really difficult times ( bereavement, young kids and barely taking any mat leave etc ) because I felt I just had to keep going as it was the right thing to do. But the area I work in and the sense of entitlement that I see everyday from people just taking all the time and the ridiculous waste that this government and previous ones seems to think is ok has just made me feel that enough is enough.

Single parents already get 3 years off.
There's no need to look for a job until you youngest child is three now is there?

A university education is not for the sole purpose of employability, encouraging anti-intellectualism, seeing everything as a consumable, even 'education', has not done us any favours.
.

On a sidenote, I'm sure there are vested interests in the maintenance of poverty. Apart from the economic power to keep people "on their toes". It creates a lot of professional jobs eg. the academic study and reporting on, the numerous initiatives trying to help mitigate against the fallout of it plus the legal profession would be smaller if poverty were eradicated?