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1455124

registered interest
date	28/03/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the Government has plans to reinstate the cross-departmental Child Poverty Unit.
tabling member constituency	Rutherglen and Hamilton West
tabling member printed	Margaret Ferrier
uin	148230
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 05/04/2022 answer text <p>A key function of the previous Child Poverty Unit was to support the delivery of the child poverty targets that we abolished in 2016, which we have no plans to reintroduce. We believe that an approach to tackling child poverty focused primarily on meeting income-based targets can drive action that focuses primarily on moving the incomes for those ‘just in poverty’ just above a ‘poverty line’ whilst doing nothing to help those on the very lowest incomes or to improve children’s future prospects.</p><p> </p><p>Ministers and officials engage extensively across Government to ensure a coordinated approach to tackling poverty and we will we continue to do so in the future.</p><p> </p><p>The latest statistics show that in 2020/21 there were 200,000 fewer children in absolute poverty before housing costs than in 2009/10.</p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley question first answered 05/04/2022 14:29:57 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4386 label Biography information for Margaret Ferrier

1452513

registered interest
date	18/03/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment her Department has made of the levels of child poverty in Bristol North West in the context of the decision to uprate universal credit by 3.1 per cent.
tabling member constituency	Bristol North West
tabling member printed	Darren Jones
uin	142503
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 23/03/2022 answer text <p>No assessment has been made.</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p>The latest statistics on the number and proportion of children who are in low income families by local area, covering the six years, 2014/15 to 2019/20, can be found in the annual publication: <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/children-in-low-income-families-local-area-statistics-2014-to-2020" target="_blank">Children in low income families: local area statistics 2014 to 2020 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab)</a>.</p><p> </p><p>This Government is committed to reducing child poverty and supporting all low-income families, and believes work is the best route out of poverty. In 2019/20, children in households where all adults were in work were around six times less likely to be in absolute poverty (before housing costs) than children in a household where nobody works.</p><p> </p><p>We are giving the lowest earners a pay rise by increasing the National Living Wage by 6.6% to £9.50 from April 2022, and making permanent changes to Universal Credit, worth £1000 a year on average, to two million in-work claimants.</p><p> </p><p>To support low income families further, we have increased the value of Healthy Start Food Vouchers to £4.25, helping eligible low income households buy basic foods like milk, fruit and vitamins. We are also investing over £200m a year from 2022, to continue our Holiday Activities and Food programme which is already providing enriching activities and healthy meals to children in all English Local Authorities. The Chancellor has extended the Household Support Fund to £1 billion to help vulnerable families.</p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley question first answered 23/03/2022 17:36:58 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4621 label Biography information for Darren Jones

1436470

registered interest
date	28/02/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what fiscal steps she is taking to tackle levels of child poverty in (a) families with three or more children and (b) other families in response to rising costs of living.
tabling member constituency	Strangford
tabling member printed	Jim Shannon
uin	131180
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 09/03/2022 answer text <p>This Government is committed to reducing child poverty and supporting all low-income families, and believes work is the best route out of poverty. Our approach is based on clear evidence about the importance of parental employment - particularly where it is full-time – in substantially reducing the risks of child poverty and in improving long-term outcomes for families and children. In 2019/20, children in households where all adults were in work were around six times less likely to be in absolute poverty (before housing costs) than children in a household where nobody works.</p><p> </p><p>Our multi-billion-pound Plan for Jobs, which has been expanded by £500 million, and the new 'Way to Work’ campaign is a national drive to get half a million people who are out of work into jobs in the next four months.</p><p> </p><p>The Government is providing £12 billion of support to ease cost of living pressures, including help for working families, low-income households and the most vulnerable. We are increasing the National Living Wage to £9.50 an hour, cutting the Universal Credit taper rate and increasing the Work Allowance to make sure work pays, freezing fuel duties to keep costs down, and providing targeted support to help households with their energy bills. A further £9 billion has been announced to protect against the impact of rising global energy prices.</p><p> </p><p>To support low income families further, we have increased the value of Healthy Start Food Vouchers to £4.25, helping eligible low income households buy basic foods like milk, fruit and vitamins. We are also investing over £200m a year to continue our Holiday Activities and Food programme which is already providing enriching activities and healthy meals to children in all English Local Authorities.</p><p /> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley question first answered 09/03/2022 11:00:15 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4131 label Biography information for Jim Shannon

1420996

registered interest
date	08/02/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to the Government Response to the Concluding Observations of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child in 2016, what steps her Department has taken to set up accountability mechanisms for the eradication of child poverty by (a) re-establishing targets with a set time frame, (b) measurable indicators and (c) regular monitoring and reporting on child poverty reduction.
tabling member constituency	Westminster North
tabling member printed	Ms Karen Buck
uin	120622
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 14/02/2022 answer text <p>The child poverty targets set out in the Child Poverty Act 2010 were abolished in 2016 and we have no plans to reintroduce them. We believe that an approach to tackling child poverty focused primarily on meeting income-based targets, can drive action that focuses primarily on moving the incomes for those ‘just in poverty’ just above a ‘poverty line’ whilst doing nothing to help those on the very lowest incomes or to improve children’s future prospects. In their place, we introduced two new statutory indicators to track progress on parental worklessness and children’s educational attainment – the two areas which can make the biggest difference to children’s long-term outcomes.</p><p>DWP tracks and monitors many different aspects of poverty, including our four statutory measures of relative income, absolute income, combined low income and material deprivation and persistent poverty.</p><p> </p><p>National Statistics on the number of people in low income and children and pensioners in material deprivation are published annually in the “Households Below Average Income” publication: <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/households-below-average-income-for-financial-years-ending-1995-to-2020" target="_blank">Households below average income: for financial years ending 1995 to 2020 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)</a></p><p> </p><p>We also measure poverty’s root causes and long-term impacts as part of our Improving Lives: Helping Workless Families publication: <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/improving-lives-helping-workless-families-indicators-2021" target="_blank">Improving Lives: Helping Workless Families indicators 2021 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)</a></p><p> </p><p>Measures of persistent poverty are published annually in Income Dynamics: <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/income-dynamics-2010-to-2019" target="_blank">Income Dynamics: 2010 to 2019 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)</a></p><p> </p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley question first answered 14/02/2022 11:08:26 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	199 label Biography information for Ms Karen Buck

1419809

registered interest
date	04/02/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment the Government has made of the implications for its policies of the findings of Action for Children’s Coronavirus during Childhood report, published in October 2020.
tabling member constituency	Kilmarnock and Loudoun
tabling member printed	Alan Brown
uin	118561
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 09/02/2022 answer text <p>We have not made any specific assessment of the implications of the findings of Action for Children’s report on the Department’s policies.</p><p> </p><p>This Government is committed to a sustainable, long-term approach to tackling child poverty and the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions continues to lead cross-Government action to ensure a co-ordinated approach to supporting low-income households. DWP’s published Outcome Delivery Plan, places addressing poverty through enabling progression in the workforce and increasing financial resilience at the heart of its mission.</p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley grouped question UIN 118563 118564 118568 question first answered 09/02/2022 16:56:58 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4470 label Biography information for Alan Brown

1419811

registered interest
date	04/02/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the Government has a strategy for tackling child poverty.
tabling member constituency	Kilmarnock and Loudoun
tabling member printed	Alan Brown
uin	118563
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 09/02/2022 answer text <p>We have not made any specific assessment of the implications of the findings of Action for Children’s report on the Department’s policies.</p><p> </p><p>This Government is committed to a sustainable, long-term approach to tackling child poverty and the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions continues to lead cross-Government action to ensure a co-ordinated approach to supporting low-income households. DWP’s published Outcome Delivery Plan, places addressing poverty through enabling progression in the workforce and increasing financial resilience at the heart of its mission.</p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley grouped question UIN 118561 118564 118568 question first answered 09/02/2022 16:56:58 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4470 label Biography information for Alan Brown

1419812

registered interest
date	04/02/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the Government has a cross-departmental strategy to reduce child poverty.
tabling member constituency	Kilmarnock and Loudoun
tabling member printed	Alan Brown
uin	118564
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 09/02/2022 answer text <p>We have not made any specific assessment of the implications of the findings of Action for Children’s report on the Department’s policies.</p><p> </p><p>This Government is committed to a sustainable, long-term approach to tackling child poverty and the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions continues to lead cross-Government action to ensure a co-ordinated approach to supporting low-income households. DWP’s published Outcome Delivery Plan, places addressing poverty through enabling progression in the workforce and increasing financial resilience at the heart of its mission.</p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley grouped question UIN 118561 118563 118568 question first answered 09/02/2022 16:56:58 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4470 label Biography information for Alan Brown

1419814

registered interest
date	04/02/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment the Government has made of the impact of increasing the child element of universal credit on reducing child poverty.
tabling member constituency	Kilmarnock and Loudoun
tabling member printed	Alan Brown
uin	118566
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 09/02/2022 answer text <p>It is not possible to produce a robust estimate of the impact of increasing the child element of universal credit on child poverty. Projecting the impacts of policies on poverty involves projecting forward the impact of the pandemic on every household’s income which is not possible to do with confidence, not least because the latest comprehensive data on net incomes for households is from 2019-20, before the pandemic began.</p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley question first answered 09/02/2022 16:44:13 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4470 label Biography information for Alan Brown

1419815

registered interest
date	04/02/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment the Government has made of the effect of increasing benefits in line with living costs on levels of child poverty.
tabling member constituency	Kilmarnock and Loudoun
tabling member printed	Alan Brown
uin	118567
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 09/02/2022 answer text <p>The Secretary of State undertakes an annual review of benefits and pensions based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measures inflation in the year to September, as has been the case since April 1987.</p><p> </p><p>This Government is committed to reducing poverty and supporting low-income families, and believes work is the best route out of poverty. Our approach is based on clear evidence about the importance of parental employment - particularly where it is full-time – in substantially reducing the risks of child poverty and in improving long-term outcomes for families and children. In 2019/20, children in households where all adults were in work, were around six times less likely to be in absolute poverty (before housing costs) than children in a household where nobody works. Compared with 2010, there were almost 1 million fewer workless households and almost 580,000 fewer children living in workless households in the UK in September 2021.</p><p> </p><p>We are giving the lowest earners a pay rise by increasing the National Living Wage by 6.6% to £9.50 from April 2022, and making permanent changes to Universal Credit, worth £1000 a year on average, to two million in-work claimants.</p><p> </p><p>With Our multi-billion-pound Plan for Jobs, which has been expanded by £500 million and the new 'Way to Work’ campaign is a national drive to get half a million people who are out of work into jobs in the next five months.</p><p> </p><p>We recognise that some people require extra support over the winter, which is why vulnerable households across the country are now able to access a £500 million support fund to help them with essentials. The Household Support Fund provides £421 million to help vulnerable people in England with the cost of food, utilities and wider essentials. The Barnett Formula applies in the usual way, with the devolved administrations receiving almost £80 million. The Barnett Formula will apply in the usual way, with the devolved administrations receiving almost £80 million (£41m for the Scottish Government, £25m for the Welsh Government and £14m for the NI Executive), for a total of £500 million.</p><p> </p><p>To support low income families further, we have increased the value of Healthy Start Food Vouchers to £4.25, helping eligible low income households buy basic foods like milk, fruit and vitamins. We are also investing over £200m a year from 2022, to continue our Holiday Activities and Food programme which is already providing enriching activities and healthy meals to children in all English Local Authorities.</p><p /><p> </p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley question first answered 09/02/2022 16:14:54 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4470 label Biography information for Alan Brown

1419816

registered interest
date	04/02/2022
answering body	Department for Work and Pensions
answering dept id	29
answering dept short name	Work and Pensions
answering dept sort name	Work and Pensions
hansard heading	Poverty: Children
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what discussions she has had with Cabinet colleagues about the potential merits of creating a dedicated Minister for tackling child poverty.
tabling member constituency	Kilmarnock and Loudoun
tabling member printed	Alan Brown
uin	118568
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 09/02/2022 answer text <p>We have not made any specific assessment of the implications of the findings of Action for Children’s report on the Department’s policies.</p><p> </p><p>This Government is committed to a sustainable, long-term approach to tackling child poverty and the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions continues to lead cross-Government action to ensure a co-ordinated approach to supporting low-income households. DWP’s published Outcome Delivery Plan, places addressing poverty through enabling progression in the workforce and increasing financial resilience at the heart of its mission.</p> answering member constituency Macclesfield answering member printed David Rutley grouped question UIN 118561 118563 118564 question first answered 09/02/2022 16:56:58 answering member 4033 label Biography information for David Rutley
tabling member	4470 label Biography information for Alan Brown