If we are to aspire to be a civilised nation, it should be a national mission to ensure every child has a decent start in life. That means we have to tackle child poverty in every sense, not limited to financial poverty, but also including the poverty of opportunity and aspiration.
Huge progress was made by the government in the first decade of the century. Educational achievement rose significantly; there was a dramatic increase in the number of children from the poorest families going on to post-16 and university education More than a million children were lifted out of financial poverty. To progress this agenda further, the Labour government passed the Child Poverty Act 2010 which set out four statutory targets on child poverty.
Unfortunately, the current government is now undoing all that good work through significant cuts in resources to lower-income working families and to people with disabilities. Just as bad, the Conservatives to cover up the real impact of their actions; they are removing the 2010 Act statutory targets through the Welfare (sic) Bill currently going through parliament. Amazingly – or, perhaps, we shouldn’t be amazed! – the Conservatives are proposing that reporting against annual targets should be replaced by reports on “life chances”, but without any information or facts about financial poverty.
In a debate about the issue, the Conservative Employment Minister, Priti Patel, said “Income is a significant part of this issue……… but there are many other causes as well.” Of course, that is absolutely correct. But, if income is so significant, why is the government determined to stop measuring it? There is only one conclusion that can be reached; the government does not want the public to see the effects of its policies on the income of households with children. Isn’t that shameful?
Of course, this attempted cover-up fits very neatly with the government’s overall strategy of cutting the collection of statistics and reliable information in a whole host of policy areas. It prefers un-evidenced assertion to solid facts. And, even facts exist, it is clear that the Conservatives are pursuing attempts to limit the Freedom of Information Act.
The poverty cover-up is well underway.
