Gingerbread, Contact, Praxis, Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG), Z2K (Zacchaeus 2000 Trust), The Runnymede Trust and The Baby Bank Alliance have collaborated on this joint briefing that outlines how investment in the social security system and wider supports as part of the forthcoming Child Poverty Strategy will help to reduce child poverty for all children. 

Summary 

In the UK, an estimated 4.5 million children (31%) are living in relative poverty, and without meaningful government action, the rate of child poverty will rise sharply. 

The risk of child poverty is higher among some groups, including single-parent families, families with disabled children, families with a disabled parent, migrant families, Black and minority ethnic families, larger families and families with young children.  

There’s a major link between social security spending and child poverty rates; with policies having the ability to exacerbate and alleviate poverty. There are also specific actions needed to ensure poverty is reduced for children and families most at risk. 

Recommendations 

• The government should address the inadequate levels of social security. Once payment levels have increased, the value of social security must be maintained in the longer term through regular uprating. 

• The government should  abolish the two-child limit and the household benefit cap: This would lift around 400,000 children out of  poverty and reduce the depth of poverty for a further 950,000 children, at the cost of 2.5bn.1

• The government should review the merits of abolishing sanctions entirely, and to ensure that if sanctions are to continue, they are only used in the most exceptional circumstances with forewarning and discussion with the claimant. 

• The government should reverse the Universal Credit conditionality rules put in place by the last government in 2023, that requires lead carers of children aged 3 to 12 to be available for work for up to 30 hours per week. 

• The government should scrap changes to the health element of Universal Credit, which will see it lowered for new claimants from 2026, before being frozen until the end of 2029-30, as detailed in the Universal Credit Bill. 

• The government should scrap its proposal to remove access to the health element of Universal Credit for young adults aged 16-21, as detailed in the Pathways to Work Green Paper. 

• The government should ensure that its commitment to co-produce the current Personal Independence Payment (PIP) review with disabled people is meaningful and includes an assurance that MPs will be able to debate and vote on a substantive motion to approve the outcome of the review. 

• The government should abolish the NRPF policy for people living, working or studying in the UK: As the NRPF condition prohibits all those subject to it from accessing public funds, reforming social security without widening access, will do little to tackle child poverty levels among migrant families. Abolition of the NRPF condition would potentially benefit 382,000 children who may be living in poverty and could provide poverty protections to children with NRPF regardless of how the condition affects them. Under this option, all households would be granted equal access to the social security system based on need, via existing means-testing.2

• The government should  work with organisations representing those most at risk of child poverty to identify the specific actions that would help alleviate poverty amongst certain groups.