The latest figures from Save the Children showing an increase in the number of the very poorest children will cause ministers concern. The charity itself acknowledges that budget measures since 2008 should have begun to turn the position round. But some children are especially at risk. Children who experience long-term ill health or disability, or who have a parent who is sick or disabled, children in larger families, children in lone parent families, children from Pakistani and Bangladeshi backgrounds, children whose parents don’t work – all face a disproportionately high risk of poverty.
Many children fall into more than one of these groups. So simple, one-club solutions aren’t the answer. And nor is narrow targeting. That’s the danger that lies in the Tories’ apparent interest in Britain’s poorest children. Their policy on child poverty (and criticism of the government) is focused on an argument that only those just below the poverty line have benefited from the reduction in child poverty achieved by Labour since 1999.
That’s not the case, but it gives Conservatives the excuse to row back on the investment Labour’s made in financial support for families. The result would be to plunge more children into poverty. The solution lies in the opposite direction. Effective measures to help the poorest children are measures that benefit all.