Child Poverty: Challenges and Solutions

Written by Rose Marie Cartledge

After welcoming everyone, Rose said the opening prayer and gave a short introduction on Child Poverty, the theme of our webinar. She then introduced the following speakers:

Ana Maria Bonny Hernandez spoke about Beijing+30.  At the conference of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) on Gender Equality in Beijing 1995, the Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action was unanimously adopted as a key policy for global empowerment of women and girls and gender equality. Every five years, the commission meets to monitor and review the progress of the implementation of Beijing declaration in different regions across the world. The next meeting is in January 2025, the 30^th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration. 

Ana works specifically in the UN CSW in European Member-states, covering 56 states. She identified 12 major areas of concern:

1. Women and Poverty;
2. Education and Training for Women;
3. Women and Health;
4. Violence against Women;
5. Women and Armed Conflict;
6. Women and the Economy;
7. Women in Power and Decision-making;
8. Institutional Mechanisms;
9. Human Rights of Women;
10. Women and Media;
11. Women and the environment;
12. The Girl child.  

Ana is currently engaged in consultations to prepare for Beijing+30 in 2025 in New York. The consultation meeting will take place in October 2024. A short film advertising the consultation in Geneva was shown.

Wendi Momen gave a powerful presentation, starting with a Baha’i prayer for children, followed  by a brief reference to the 78^th anniversary of the UN and its goals:  to maintain international peace and security and to that end, to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to peace.

One of the major threats to peace is poverty.  One of the aims therefore is to end poverty in all its forms by 2030. It is estimated that 1.1 billion people around the world live in some form of poverty.  She identified the drivers of child poverty – conflicts and wars, climate change and consequent food chain disruption affecting the price of food, poor governance in many countries, lack of universal education leading to an inability to think of positive solutions, underemployment and lack of jobs, high cost of housing and accommodation, discrimination of people in marginalised communities or difficult situations affecting children and families, natural disasters making people homeless and destroying livelihoods, and social barriers created by poverty. 

She suggested that there are solutions that can end poverty if we are willing to consider them. These solutions will require a focus not only on money or material means, but also on spiritual qualities identified as justice based on the quality of mind and soul; personal virtues such as trustworthiness in delivering services, justice and governance; honesty and truth as opposed to a lack of honesty in communications, e.g. in fake news aimed at creating strife affecting many people adversely is dishonest; patience in times of difficulty by leaders and organisations to recognise that it takes time for people to rebuild lives; and selflessness. These qualities need to be built into our systems. And the most important virtue is Love which is the greatest of all. 

What we need to build into our service to help others is a love of God, love of humanity and of service to humanity.  We need to work in unity around the world. 

We are one people living on one planet.  “Consider the world as a body.  We need every part of the body for the body to survive.”

Margaret Clark discussed the issue of homelessness in the country and in Middlesbrough.  She started her presentation with a brief summary on the SVP and its goal to tackle poverty and help disadvantaged people by providing direct practical help to anyone.   There are over 10000 voluntary members in England and Wales who visit the lonely, the sick, the marginalised, the imprisoned, and the homeless.  One of the missions of the SVP is advocacy. 

The SVP are working towards three main objectives:  

1. To strengthen the social security system to help people to meet their aspirations.  A strong and reliable SS safety net is needed to address regional inequalities and to support people who are left behind in neighbourhoods.   We also need measures to boost productivity, revitalise communities and address inequalities between regions, but this can only be achieved with a strong welfare system, with an increase in the basic rate of the universal credit standard allowance and an introduction to an essential guarantee.  
2. To recognise the role that charities play in delivering local services and to review the current model of delivering services to the community.  Our frontline services that we are asked to deliver now were originally carried out by the local authority.  If we are to level up regional inequalities, cuts to core services must be reversed and the role charities play to tackle poverty must be clearly acknowledged.  Measures should include more funding for local authorities and NHS provision. The government must also rethink its model for delivering services – who is delivering local services and how is this funded.
3. To devolve authority and funding to local decision-makers.  We believe that the key to success of long-term strategy to address regional inequalities is to help local stakeholders to deliver services by working closely with them, and drawing on local knowledge and insights on local challenges and solutions as each area has different cultures, needs and communities.

Margaret indicated areas of greatest deprivation highlighted in deep yellow on a map of England, with Middlesbrough having the highest level of child poverty in the country, exacerbated by the cost-of-living crisis after COVID. 

Homelessness is one of big problems in this area.  Margaret mentioned that the SVP has been working at a local community level for over 180 years in areas identified as a priority by government policy.  The SVP has lots of community drop-in centres, volunteers to visit homes and to visit people individually.  In 2022/23, the SVP provided 80000 meals at SVP centres, and supported 19000 people through food banks supplying over 46000 meals.  2024 has seen an increase.   

Homelessness has increased in European countries.  Close to 1 million people are homeless every night in the EU and in the UK, with people on the streets.  Research indicates that the number of homeless is a lot higher, depending on the method or criteria used to measure homelessness. France, UK and Germany have the highest rates with 43 per 10000 people.  The UK has the highest level of homelessness per 10000 people.  Who are homeless?  Participants were invited to put their answers in the chat.  Homelessness is fluid, depending on individual circumstances – Sofa surfing, leaving care, fleeing domestic violence, leaving prison, refugees. 

Three categories not included in the figures:  people in institutions / non-conventional dwellings and people in temporary accommodation with family and friends, and sometimes in bed and breakfast, without access during the day except in the evening.  So, they end up having to be on the street all day; Some private rentals are in unsatisfactory conditions.  Some end up being homeless because they have lost their jobs or have broken relationships.  Poverty can cause homelessness when relationships break up as a result of conflicts  brought on by financial /economic problems.

Homelessness has multiple facets in the complex interplay between structural, institutional, relationships and personal factors that contribute to someone being homeless.  The rate of homelessness in the England and Wales has doubled in the last 13 years. 

Siobhan Gabriel is co-ordinator of Vinny Packs given to the homeless, consisting of a hat, scarf and gloves given free of charge throughout the country.  They cost £4, given as donation.  SVP also has centres that offer hot food and drinks to the homeless, with temporary and sometimes permanent accommodation if available;  and wellness clinics.  One day a week, different charities provide a hot meal for the homeless.  The SVP provides this service on Saturdays.  They not only give meals but also offer other services, as well clothes, tents and sleeping bags, and toiletries, and hairdressing services.

Emma Revie started her presentation by saying that Trussell is an anti-poverty charity and a community of food banks.  They work together to ensure that no one in the UK needs a food bank to survive, while providing emergency food and practical support for people left without money to live on. 

There are 1400 food bank centres supported by 36 000 volunteers, 4 000 churches and hundreds of thousands of community groups and schools and millions who make their work possible every year.  They are all Trussell.

Her talk was on Food insecurity: 

Hunger in the UK Research project indicates that 1 out of 7 people is experiencing low or very low food security, i.e. 11.3 million people missing at least one meal a day. 3.1 million emergency food parcels were distributed in 2023/24, which is double the amount five years ago.  Emergency food parcels are a last resort.  Figures on table predate covid and the cost-of-living crisis.  71% of people facing hunger do not access the food banks.  They try to exhaust all other options before turning to the food banks.  New figures show that 9.3 million are experiencing hunger and hardship.  These are people who fall 25% below the minimum standard for poverty.  425 000 will be pulled into hunger and hardship within two years, with 40% of them being children, if no action is taken; 53% in hunger and hardship are disabled, affecting 5 million people, an increase of 1.2 million people over the last 10 years. 

Ethnic minorities are also more likely to experience hunger and hardship.  28% black African/ Caribbean people and black British families face hunger and hardship, compared to 11% in white families.  These are structural injustices that exist in  our society.  There has been a deepening of poverty for children failing into destitution and in hunger and hardship, particularly those with loan parent families.  Data in terms of age show that the group with the highest risk relate to families with children under 5, while the worsening situation for families with 3 or more children has driven the increase in hunger and hardship across in the UK.

One in four experiencing hunger and hardship is in families with 3 or more children, which has doubled in a decade. The negative impact of hunger and hardship includes the stigma and its social impact on children’s relationship with their peers, with them feeling ashamed of their situation and unable to engage with others, and being bullied. Another negative impact is on physical health and development, and on the developmental and educational impact through reduced concentration.   It presents a great toll on parents too.  Children are also affected when they see their parents going without food.

What is driving this problem and what are the solutions:

Drivers

1.  Low income is essentially the root of this problem, creating deep financial hardship. Hunger is not about the lack of food, but rather a lack of income.  This is largely attributed to the design and delivery of our social security system.  
2. Linked to this is the high level of debt among people experiencing hunger and hardship, often caused by the rules of our social security system itself, e.g. the five-week wait for their first universal credit payment forcing people to go into debt until they get payments;
3.  The  high cost of utility and rents; 
4. Work  / employment is not providing a reliable route out of hunger and hardship anymore.  58% of people facing hunger and hardship are in families with someone in work. Many of them, especially single parents, are trapped in low-paid work and insecure jobs, with little opportunity to progress.  
5. it is difficult for them to access support, advice, wider services and community networks at the right time and so cannot benefit from the protective impact that community support and relationships can provide.  
6. Adverse life events can play critical role.

Solutions

Everyone should be able to afford the essentials. We need:

1a. A social security system to protect people from hunger and hardship.  This is essential to end hunger and hardship.  We need to make our social security system fit for purpose.

1b. A functioning local crisis support system that offers crisis cash support, readily available locally providing quick, responsive support so that short-term crisis does not turn to long-term hardship, e.g. unexpected expenses.

1c. Financial inclusion services that prioritise people facing hunger and hardship, not just about basic bank accounts but also investment in solutions, like advice to maximise incomes and provide affordable credit.

2a.  More targeted support to tackle the disproportionate hardship that groups, like children, face, that also includes better decision-making for disabled people on social security.  Too many of them have to wait for months for decisions which they have to appeal before they can see any support for which they are entitled.  

2b. Investment in voluntary and specialist employment support for those facing barriers to work, like parents and disabled people.

2c.  Address the various caps and limits affecting families and children, e.g., the two-child benefit cap and benefits cap.

3a. Protective factors: strengthen protective factors, e.g. 

• Workers’ rights
• Availability of decent and rewarding work
• Safe, secure and affordable homes, particularly social housing 
• Inclusive, empowered communities where people can get the right support at the right time; 
• Local services that are designed and delivered to reflect the actual needs of communities and where communities have more powers to determine what happens in their spaces.

Trussell’s work

Provide emergency food parcels and other practical support, e.g. 

1. Financial inclusion support
2. Holiday clubs for young children
3. During the holidays, provided additional food parcels for families

Campaigning in partnership with the Joseph Rowntree Foundations, supported by some 130 organisations to call for a just and compassionate society, where everyone can afford the essentials necessary to live.  We are campaigning for

• A fundamental change in our social security system to increase the basic rate of the standard allowance of the universal credit to cover the essentials
• For an independent body to be set up, that could recommend the level at which social security should be paid, rather than be subject to the political will of the day, e.g. like a pay commission establishing minimum levels and ensuring that payments will cover the essentials.

The Webinar ended with a short conclusion statement, followed by a vote of thanks to everyone and a final prayer.