Iain Duncan Smith’s new plan to prolong child poverty

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Iain Duncan Smith wants to talk about child poverty – but how can we take him seriously when he starts the discussion with a lie?

“Recent analysis reveals that children are three times as likely to be in poverty in a workless family and there are now fewer children living in workless households than at any time since records began, having fallen by 274,000 since 2010,” according to the Department for Work and Pensions’ press release on the new consultation.

Oh really?

According to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF), child poverty will rise from 2.5 million to 3.2 million during the 2010-2015 Parliament – around 24 per cent of all the children in the UK. By 2020, if the rise is not stopped, it will increase to four million – around 30 per centof all children in the UK.

Under the Coalition government, the number of people in working families who are living in poverty – at 6.7 million – has exceeded the number in workless and retired families who are in poverty – 6.3 million – for the first time.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has measured poverty, using several indicators, for more than 15 years; its figures are far more likely to be accurate than those of the government, which is still defining poverty as an income of less than 60 per cent of median (average) earnings. Average earnings are falling, so fewer people are defined as being in poverty – but that doesn’t make the money in their pockets go any further.

“The previous government’s target to halve child poverty by 2010 was not achieved,” states the DWP press release. Then it comes out with more nonsense: “The government is committed to ending child poverty in the UK by 2020 and the draft child poverty strategy sets out the government’s commitment to tackle poverty at its source.” From the JRF figures alone, we know that government policy is worsening the situation – or has everyone forgotten that 80,000 children woke up homeless last Christmas morning?

shame

Let’s look at the government’s plans.

The DWP claims “reforming the welfare system through Universal Credit… will lift up to 300,000 children out of poverty, and cover 70 per cent of childcare costs for every hour worked”. But we know that Universal Credit is effectively a benefit cut for everyone put onto it; they won’t get as much as they do on the current benefits, and the one per cent uprating limit means falling further into poverty every year. Also, we found out this week that the housing element will be subject to sanctions if people in part-time jobs cannot persuade their employers to give them more hours of work. The claim is ridiculous.

The DWP claims the government will will increase investment in the Pupil Premium, provide free school meals for all infant school children from September this year, improve teacher quality, fund 15 hours of free early education places per week for all three- and four-year-old children and extend 15 hours of free education and care per week to two-year-olds from low income families. None of these measures will do anything to “tackle poverty at its source”. Tackling poverty at its source means ending the causes of poverty, not putting crude metaphorical sticking-plasters over the effects – which could be removed at any time in the future.

The DWP claims the government will cut tax for 25 million people by increasing the personal tax allowance, and cut income tax for those on the minimum wage by almost two-thirds. This means people will have more money in their pocket – but will it be enough, when benefit cuts and sanctions are taken into account? Will their pay increase with the rate of inflation? There is no guarantee that it will. And this move means the government will collect less tax, limiting its ability to provide services such as poverty-reduction measures.

The DWP claims the government will reduce water and fuel costs, and attack housing costs by building more homes. The first two measures may be seen as responses to aggressive policy-making by the Labour Party, and the last will only improve matters if the new dwellings are provided as social housing. Much of the extra spending commitment is made for 2015 onwards, when the Conservative-led Coalition may not even be in office.

These are plans to prolong poverty, not end it.

It is notable that the DWP press release repeats many of the proposals in an attempt to pretend it is doing more. Take a look at the list and count for yourself the number of times it mentions fuel/energy bills (three times) and free school meals (twice).

In fact, the only measures that are likely to help reduce the causes of poverty are far down the list: Increasing access to affordable credit by expanding credit unions and cracking down on payday lending (at the very bottom – and we’ll have to see whether this really happens because payday lenders are generous donors to the Conservative party); and reviewing – mark that word, ‘reviewing’ – the national minimum wage, meaning that the government might increase the minimum wage in accordance with Low Pay Commission recommendations.

The DWP press release quotes Iain Duncan Smith, who said the consultation re-states the government’s commitment to tackle poverty at its source, “be it worklessness, family breakdown, educational failure, addiction or debt”.

The measures he has proposed will not improve anybody’s chance of finding a job, nor will they prevent family breakdown, or addiction. The plans for education have yet to be tested and may not work. The plan for debt involves annoying Conservative Party donors.

The JRF has responded to the consultation diplomatically, but there can be no mistaking the impatience behind the words of Chris Goulden, head of poverty research. He said: “Given that it has been over a year since the initial consultation on child poverty measures, we are disappointed that the government is now going to take even longer to agree what those indicators will be.

“With one in four families expected to be in poverty by 2020, a renewed strategy to address child poverty is vital. Any effective strategy should be based on evidence and contain measures to reduce the cost of living and improve family incomes. However, until those measures are agreed, it is difficult to see how the government can move forward.”

Don’t be too concerned about moving forward, Chris.

This government is backsliding.

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8 thoughts on “Iain Duncan Smith’s new plan to prolong child poverty

  1. Jonathan Wilson

    I haven’t read the report… but wanted to comment on this “The DWP press release quotes Iain Duncan Smith, who said the consultation re-states the government’s commitment to tackle poverty at its source, “be it worklessness, family breakdown, educational failure, addiction or debt”.”

    So what he is saying is that poverty is the fault of the poor for being scum (in his eyes) it’s all because they have problems that they are poor, no mention of the millions in poverty or pittance wages just about holding their heads above water but with no “profit” or spare cash for life’s little things/pleasures.

    Quite frankly I, and most people I know IRL and via facebook pages etc, just think the guy is a total cockwomble; the quite frankly lamentable “a DWP spokesperson” response to even quite detailed questions that fail to answer the question involved just goes to show how rogue the DWP under untersturmfuhrer Irritable Dickensian Smythe has become… quite frankly the DWP, IBS, et al are no longer fit for work.

    Sadly I have no idea of what can be done with such an out of control person and department that has lost all compassion and is quite frankly starting to look dangerously fascistic and determined to do everything it can to punish the poor for being poor; even the language has been heard before with Fraud’s “work sets you free [of the bedroom tax]” style linguistics and the Gwant/Gween/current fake name Schnapps “[National Socialist English] Workers’ Party” re-branding.

    I just hope that by 2015 they will have p***ed off just one too many manufactured groups to humiliate and demean and dehumanize (note that very same modus of operandi used so well in Germany)… they are already mulling over “rich pensioners” and how “the pensioners will bankrupt the UK” and “it’s all the baby-boomers’ fault”. “pensioners cost too much in medicines with no profit to the UK” subtext of recent “DM/Sun/BBC/right wing “wonktanks” articles.

  2. joanna

    So are they saying that older school children should starve then? All I see is free school meals for infant children, also since when were 5,6,7 or 8year olds infants

  3. Angie Harding

    So the UK is the 7th richest country in the world and we have children/family’s living in poverty and from what I have seen the children/family’s in the 21st century are worse off than in Dickens day, I think it’s time for us as a people to get onto the street.

  4. Joseph Smith

    Bet Cameron’s given Putin a few quid to be naughty to take the pressure of the flooding fiasco and the DWPs murderous activities. Ian Duncan Smith? Is he worth wasting a bullet on? Can’t make my mind up shoot the pig or wait for him to fall after being exposed and we stand around laughing.

Comments are closed.