Today the End Child Poverty coalition published their annual Child Poverty Map of the UK which local authorities and parliamentary constituencies across the UK and shows the proportion of children living in poverty in each. (Full disclosure: the TUC is a proud member of End Child Poverty.)
It always comes as something of a shock to see the differences between areas and these figures show how child poverty rates are much higher in large cities, especially London, Birmingham and Manchester. Manchester has a 40% rate of child poverty and Birmingham 37%. Among the 20 constituencies with the highest levels of childhood poverty, seven are in London, three in Birmingham, and three in Manchester.
Following on from a previous Touchstone blog post (about families hit by the Benefit Cap), I couldn’t help wondering whether there’s a relationship between how many children in an area are going to be hurt by the Benefit Cap and the proportion of children in that area who are poor. This isn’t as simple a matter as you might imagine – the Cap mainly hits people getting above average amounts of Housing Benefit, so average rents in an area affect the number who are Capped, as well as the number of families relying on benefits.
Even so, there is a relationship. First let’s look at the 20 local authorities with the highest proportion of children in poverty and the number of children hit by the Benefit Cap in August 2016:
% of children in poverty 2015 (AHC)
Number of Benefit Capped children
1. Tower Hamlets
43.5%
1,336
2. Manchester
40.0%
1,091
3. Westminster
37.7%
690
4. Islington
37.7%
445
5. Newham
37.5%
1,267
6. Birmingham
37.4%
3,209
7. Hackney
37.1%
931
8. Middlesbrough
37.0%
337
9. Nottingham
37.0%
619
10. Southwark
36.7%
583
11. Barking & Dagenham
36.6%
855
12. Lambeth
36.1%
693
13. Leicester
35.9%
574
14. Blackpool
35.5%
269
15. Hull
35.4%
386
16. Camden
35.2%
478
17. Sandwell
34.9%
720
18. Lewisham
34.7%
851
19. Waltham Forest
34.6%
911
20. Wolverhampton
34.6%
609
And now let’s look at the 20 local authorities with the lowest child poverty rates:
% of children in poverty 2015 (AHC)
Number of Benefit Capped children
1. Wokingham
10.4%
110
2. Shetland Islands
10.6%
0
3. Ribble Valley
11.3%
0
4. Hart
11.9%
0
5. S Northamptonshire
12.5%
0
6. Harborough
12.7%
0
7. Waverley
12.8%
21
8. Aberdeenshire
13.1%
84
9. South Oxfordshire
13.1%
75
10. West Oxfordshire
13.1%
81
11. Mid Sussex
13.3%
95
12. Mole Valley
13.3%
25
13. Rushcliffe
13.3%
0
14. St Albans
13.7%
157
15. South Cambridgeshire
13.8%
50
16. Uttlesford
13.8%
24
17. Chiltern
13.8%
98
18. Rutland
13.9%
0
19. Richmond upon Thames
13.9%
179
20. Horsham
14.0%
58
When you look at these tables it becomes easier to understand why some people don’t think austerity has done much harm: there are plenty of places where a policy like the Benefit Cap hasn’t affected many people locally. But it also underlines the fact that government policies are set to make life tougher for poor children in deprived areas.
Child poverty is on the rise and concentrated in the places the government’s policies will hurt
Child poverty is on the rise and concentrated in the places the government’s policies will hurt
Richard Exell
Senior Policy Officer, TUC and Vice-Chair of End Child Poverty
(This blog has also been published on the TUC Touchstone Blog)
Today the End Child Poverty coalition published their annual Child Poverty Map of the UK which local authorities and parliamentary constituencies across the UK and shows the proportion of children living in poverty in each. (Full disclosure: the TUC is a proud member of End Child Poverty.)
It always comes as something of a shock to see the differences between areas and these figures show how child poverty rates are much higher in large cities, especially London, Birmingham and Manchester. Manchester has a 40% rate of child poverty and Birmingham 37%. Among the 20 constituencies with the highest levels of childhood poverty, seven are in London, three in Birmingham, and three in Manchester.
Following on from a previous Touchstone blog post (about families hit by the Benefit Cap), I couldn’t help wondering whether there’s a relationship between how many children in an area are going to be hurt by the Benefit Cap and the proportion of children in that area who are poor. This isn’t as simple a matter as you might imagine – the Cap mainly hits people getting above average amounts of Housing Benefit, so average rents in an area affect the number who are Capped, as well as the number of families relying on benefits.
Even so, there is a relationship. First let’s look at the 20 local authorities with the highest proportion of children in poverty and the number of children hit by the Benefit Cap in August 2016:
And now let’s look at the 20 local authorities with the lowest child poverty rates:
When you look at these tables it becomes easier to understand why some people don’t think austerity has done much harm: there are plenty of places where a policy like the Benefit Cap hasn’t affected many people locally. But it also underlines the fact that government policies are set to make life tougher for poor children in deprived areas.