Severe child poverty has increased

[BetsyBoop]

BBC News item

"13% of the UK's children were living in severe poverty, up two percentage points on 2004."

"Save the Children defines severe poverty as those living in households with incomes of less than 50% of the UK median income disregarding housing costs) and who were also missing some basic possessions, such as a winter coat."

"Save the Children's director of UK programmes Fergus Drake said: "It's shocking that at a time when the UK was experiencing unprecedented levels of wealth the number of children living in severe poverty - we're talking about children going without a winter coat, a bed and other day-to-day essentials - actually increased."

The story varies across the UK. In Northern Ireland, 8% of children are extremely poor. In Scotland it is 9% while in England and Wales it is 13% - a figure pushed up by the situation in London where 19% of youngsters live in severe poverty. "

Part of me finds this totally shocking and part of me thinks surely this can't be true. Are one in 8 children (one in 5 in London) really not getting enough food, warm clothes & a bed to sleep in?

I find it hard to believe that families are in a position where they can't get a winter coat or bed for their children.

Isn't there a set amount for families on benefits? My niece is a single mum and has 4 children they all have winter coats (probably have about 3 or 4 each) and beds. When she had her last child she was given a grant (not repayable) to buy a bed for her third child. So why are there other children going without? I don't understand.

When I was about 15 I had a boyfriend and visited his cousins house. I was shocked at the poverty. They only had one light bulb in the house, there was one mattress, no carpets or chairs and the house was squalid. The children were clearly neglected and were hungry. My bf's cousin who was also 15 was bullied at school because he only had one outfit which was about 20 years out of date. It was the most depressing sight that I had ever witnessed in my life. The mother was obviously receiving benefits but had mental health issues and clearly could not ensure that her childrens basic needs were being met. Is this the problem now? Are children going without because their parents can't cope?

I can quite believe it sadly - at the 2001 census there were 14.8 million "children" (under the age of 20) in the UK. The government want (haha) to reduce the number of children living in poverty to half of the 1998/89 levels of 3.4 million..........

sadly the maths (even using the governments figures) do add up.

there's no "set" amount for families on benefits

you get £64.30 a week IS/JSA if you're single, £100 (and a few pence) a week for a couple. Then you get CTC for each child and child benefit . So a single parent with one child would get approx £130 a week to live on (the figures used exclude housing costs). Works out at £560 a month.

And also..............that figure doesn't only include those living on benefits - it includes huge numbers of the working poor in our country - those that don't claim benefits but earn a pittance.

I think it depends on the definition of poverty tbh.

I read somewhere that the definitions of poverty have recently been re-defined and include things like not being able to afford broadband. If that criteria is included in the stats then I imagine it could well be true, but would argue that someone who can't afford broadband isn't living in poverty but just isn't well off.

But I don't believe that 13% of children are living without food or a bed or adequate clothing.

Even the national average figure doesn't make for a good measure because the national average will take into account those earning way above the majority and that will inflate the figure. Plus cost of living varies from place to place so someone earning 50% of the national average in London for example will be in a more difficult financial position that someone earning 50% of the national average in say, liverpool, where the cost of living is lower.

Oh well if they are using broadband as a criteria then we must be living in poverty also. Our broadband is paid for as dh needs it for work, if it wasn't there is no way we would pay for it. Thats just daft, broadband is not a necessity.

I agree, but it is apparently considered to be one these days.

Where I live there is a problem with people on benefits or low incomes being offered expensive credit in the form of loans from the Provident or hire-purchase goods from Brighthouse. The interest rates are shocking.

Also, if people don't have budgeting skills, the skills to cook nutritious meals cheaply, transport to where affordable food can be bought or drug / alcohol problems it's easy to see where the money goes. Abilities and priorities

The thing is how many of these children are in circumstances like that due to the parents not being able to provide them? More likely imo/e the parent/s chose not to provide them.

wannabe - the figures used in the stats don't include housing costs - so makes no difference whether their rent ins £1000pcm or £300pcm.

My children don't go without food (and didn't when I was single parent) - but I often skipped meals/had something different from them to compensate.

"Even the national average figure doesn't make for a good measure because the national average will take into account those earning way above the majority and that will inflate the figure."

The average is a median average, so it stacks up all the incomes in the country from high to low and picks the one right in the middle.

So that does tend to smooth out the effect of extremes that would somewhat distort a mean average. Exactly half the population will earn at least the median average, exactly half will earn at most the median average.

"Poverty" is therefore very relative. If everyone certainly doubled their pay packet exactly the same % would still be defined as "living in poverty".

And it's that relativity that means that the NSPCC are including the "winter coat" in the mix as well to try and give what they see as a fairer impression of "poverty" than relative income.

Tackling poverty by attacking the percentage below the median is also really just wealth redistribution, which may or may not be a bad thing but is a bit of a loaded phrase.

The way you would resolve the problem is to get those earning less than the given percentage of the "middle persons income" more money, which can be done without having any affect on that middle person by taking from people above them.

Or cynically you can drag down the income of that middle person those lowering the threshold for "poverty" while not needing to do anything to anyone who earns more than that middle person.

Averages are great...

the mother in the BBC video is complaining that her baby has to wear hand me downs....not sure why that is a measure of poverty.

I guess because if you can't even afford to spend £2-3 buying kids clothes in asda/matalan/primark then you haven't got much money?

Nothing wrong with hand me downs.

no there's nothing wrong with hand-me-downs - but if you're in position where you can't afford to buy anything new (even the cheap stuff) surely that's sign of poverty?

But in most cases it's down to the families not prioritising or budgeting properly.

ie choosing fags, booze and bookies money before a trip to the supermarket - the woman in the video was talking about her credit cards.

there are

a) those people who are doing ok - managing credit cards etc, then suddenly find themselves unemployed etc - credit card debts don't go away

b) those who are effectively "forced" to take out expensive credit because their budget is so small that anything that doesn't fall within food and utilities bills there's no money for.

I can speak from experience to say it's not all about budgeting and priorities - often things come up that you don't have the money for.

I need to buy DS1 some more trousers (no-one to "hand me down" from). Thankfully DS3 now fits into some of DS2's old ones so DS1 will probably get some new trousers at the weekend.

I remember the days when H was earning £16k (so not a huge salary) and I would have been able to go out a few weeks ago when both DS's suddenly s hot up and buy them both new trousers.

DS's friend has no winter coat, had only canvas shoes to wear in the snow, sleeps on a blow up bed with his 2 brothers in a sitting room. He is secondary school age.

The benefit payments are ok if you don't have any other expenditure beyond fuel/food/clothing/transport. If you have any knd of debt you'd struggle.

The middle classes often have this judging by their own standards way of viewing low income families. What I mean by that is they assume that everybody has the same coping mechanisms/life skills - actually to the point where its kind of assumed that those on lower budgets ought to be better at finanacial planning!

I'm a social worker. I've seen families who manage admiralably well on low incomes and I've seen those who are hopeless at it and everything in between but I can well believe there are too many kids out there who don't have adequate food/clothes.

Not being able to afford broadband/a computer is pretty bad I think. Not being able to shop online means that you may have to pay more for stuff (particularly if you don't have a car) and DCs would be disadvantaged in terms of education.

No problem at all with hand me downs.

It all comes down to how poverty is defined - absolute poverty is not having absolute life basics, eg food etc. Relative poverty is where it stops you participating fully in society eg not having a computer. The thing with relative poverty is that as everyone else gets richer more people end up in relative poverty as the bar gets raised.

I don't think there's really a realistic answer to be honest, giving more benefits will only stave of. Cycles of deprivation make it hard to get out of.

Using this percentage approach condemns us to perpetual poverty as there will always be a quartile earning less than 50% of average earnings.

Unless you have a communist society and everyone earns the same.

giving more benefits to those on benefits also won't help the working poor .

I think the point about those below 50% is a fair one - which is now they try and use other factors (such as winter coats, beds, broadband etc) to compare as well.

I know there's nothing wrong with hand-me-downs - I posted it before - BUT I think the key things is that it's one thing using handmedowns because you want to and another using them because you have to - because you can't actually AFFORD to go and buy new (cheap) clothes.

(ironically when I could have afforded to go to Tesco/Matalan/Primark to buy the DS's new clothes I was inundated with hand me downs - so never did, now I don't get hand me downs anymore I can't afford to go and buy them new clothes when they need them.........and actually DS1's trousers may have to wait as the flipping iron has died this afternoon >)

"Using this percentage approach condemns us to perpetual poverty as there will always be a quartile earning less than 50% of average earnings.

Unless you have a communist society and everyone earns the same."

No, the definition of "poverty" that the Government uses is having less than 60% of the median household income.

"Beating" that definition of "poverty" can be done increasing the incomes of everyone who is below the 60% line up to that line, that could be done without having any effect on that median income either.

MillyR why does your ds's friend not have a coat or proper shoes? What about his parents, do they have proper clothing?

I like the distinction between relative and absolute poverty

I can understand that relative poverty is on the increase, you'd sort of expect that in a recession anyway? This is not a problem if it is short term (parent out of work for a few months), but long term it can affect a child's life chances.

Surely there should be very few children living in absolute poverty ?

If there wasn't enough food, my kids would eat before I would. If they didn't have a coat I'd alter something of mine to fit them or alter a hand-me-down/charity shop purchase. If they don't have a bed I'm pretty sure you can get a Social Fund grant for that? (or I'd give up mine for them) Aren't we really talking about parental neglect some of the time here?

Thedollshouse, I don't know why he doesn't have these things. The younger children are properly dressed and so is the mum. The dad doesn't live with them.