So says Frank Field, and he should know. In a paper for Reform (download), he predicts the Government will miss its "audacious" target of halving
child poverty by 2011 and that government policy:
- "has missed its 2004-05 target of a reduction of a quarter in child poverty and fallen further behind last year"
- "has seen no change in the numbers of children in severe poverty"
- "leaves one in five of poor children in persistently poor households"
He found that because of the discrimination against two-parent families:
- "the risk of poverty has hardly changed for children in two-parent families"
- "half of all poor children are in working families despite the Government’s belief that working is the best route out of poverty"
- "the numbers of children in working poor households is back at the level it was in 1995"
The Director of Reform, Andrew Haldenby, told ConservativeHome:
"Child poverty will remain at the heart of politics whoever wins the next election. The Government’s target to “eradicate” child poverty by 2020 is its defining commitment to social justice. In November, David Cameron said that the next Conservative Government would seek to reduce poverty in relative terms (in practice the same as the Government’s position).
Current policies will not deliver for either party. In his latest paper for Reform, Frank Field, the former Minister for Welfare Reform, shows that extra spending on taxes and benefits has amounted to £13 billion since 1997, yet progress on child poverty has stalled since 2001-02. He makes three recommendations: a redesign of the tax credits system to end the bias against two-parent families (which now contain over half of children in poverty); an improvement to the child support system; and education reform.
In recent speeches and interviews, both George Osborne and John Hutton have signalled a wish to think about new ways to tackle poverty. I hope that Frank Field’s ideas will influence their thinking."
The findings of the report are won't surprise many, but they are yet another damning indictment of Brown's failed approach to tackling poverty in the long-term. Understandably, Frank is one of the first people to decline an invitation to write for this site!
Deputy Editor
What is he doing in that Party? They will never listen even when it is staring at them right in their faces.
Posted by: Rachel Joyce | June 14, 2007 at 19:08
What is he doing in that Party?
Well, judging by some of the 'Tory Moderniser' comments before and since Cameron he may as well stay put.
As far as I am concerned the only proper environment in which children should be brought up is that provided by a legally married husband and wife or, obviously that provided by a widow or deserted wife.
The grovelling respect now given by all political parties to unmarried mothers, 'partners' and the like is a calculated insult to all married couples.
Posted by: Traditional Tory | June 14, 2007 at 19:47
Offensive rubbish, Traditional Tory. Support for marriage in the tax system is vital but there is no need to pour scorn on those in other relationships. You are doubtless a 'back to basics' sort of chap. It is not the place of a political party to act like a preacher.
Posted by: Tory T | June 14, 2007 at 19:57
Field's report is highly misleading and is fisked well by the 'Ministry of Truth' here:
http://www.ministryoftruth.org.uk/2007/06/14/hes-not-the-messiah-hes-a-fuckwit
Posted by: VS | June 14, 2007 at 19:58
but there is no need to pour scorn on those in other relationships
I seem to recall that a High Court judge once described such people as 'masquerading as husband and wife'
He got it right in one.
I have no objection to single people of opposite sexes carrying on as they wish. I've done it myself in the long distant past. But when children are involved failure to legitimise is unpardonable.
Posted by: Traditional Tory | June 14, 2007 at 20:07
Frank Field is quite right but, in some respects, pulls his punches.
The Welfare State is now the Welfare Trap.
Once you are entangled in it, it becomes impossible to rise by your own efforts as any extra income is clawed back in loss of benefits.
As Frank Field also points out, the loss of benefits for a two parent household also makes it very difficult for a single mother to legimitately enter a new partnership or marriage.
We see the consequences all around us.
People without hope of a better future.
Children who learn not to hope of a better future.
Violence and other crimes fuelled by resentment of the success that they see other people experiencing.
Ghetto estates in which the unhappy and unsuccessful fuel each other's depression.
As the song put it, "we've got to get out of this place."
Posted by: James Strachan | June 14, 2007 at 21:15
"It is not the place of a political party to act like a preacher."
Um, where have you been during ConHome's regular abortion sermons?
Posted by: Chelloveck | June 15, 2007 at 06:21
As far as I am concerned the only proper environment in which children should be brought up is that provided by a legally married husband and wife or, obviously that provided by a widow or deserted wife.
What about deserted husbands? We don't live in 1952 you know.
Posted by: renny | June 15, 2007 at 08:42
The tax credit systems is deeply flawed as Frank Field explains, let alone the fact that it spews out incorrect £100's of millions which are not collectable back, and it is also subject to widespread fraud.
There are other effects.
Because Broon has volunteered government money (and I mean big money, not mere assistance but more like enough to live on) to pay for children (single parents working 16 hours a week get £487 after tax credits - an astonishing £30 an hour equivalent), there are far larger numbers of children being born.
The more children you have, the more money you get. The programme is ultimately self-defeating, as the pool of demand ('poverty') is growing rapidly.
My brother has six childtren. It was not worth both he and his wife working because of tax credits, so he's gone down to three days a week, and she's part time too. The country gets exactly what it pays for - more children and less work.
I'm single with no children myself. Because tax rates on taking money out from my company is now 63.8% (40% Income Tax plus 23.8% Nat Ins), I now live from rental income (taxed at 40%) and so I too am no longer working (pre-1997 you could take money from a company taxed at 40%).
Broon has pushed both my brother and myself out of work - me, by taxing so highly it's not worth it, and my brother because of supposedly 'eradicating child poverty'!
It's work that Brown's eradicating - not child poverty! All of this talk of hard working families is a joke. With Gordon paying for it all, they can put their feet up, shag without contraceptives, and party.
Posted by: tapestry | June 15, 2007 at 09:35
Tapestry, that is of course the goal: ever greater numbers of people dependent on the bloated welfare state for their way of life and therefore beholden to the Labour Party at the polls. Brown has long calculated that he can fleece the aspirational classes/lower middle classes as much as he likes because the Tories will not stand up for them (cf the grammar schools debacle) and they tend to vote Tory anyway. There will be no outcry from the super-rich whom Brown has fiscally featherbedded.
Posted by: Michael McGowan | June 15, 2007 at 10:44
What is child poverty? I am somewhat bemused by this statement and this new area of concern that seems to have been dreamt up by the left.
Surely poverty does not apply to children, they are not in employ and have no bills to pay. If there is poverty it applies to the parents.
On this point, surely it is incumbent on the parents to ensure that they have an adequate income prior to deciding to breed, sufficient to provide for the needs of a family. If parents are reckless, and breed without the necessary fiscal support, why should the state support them? State support in such an example only encourages reckless behaviour, a cycle of support and is discriminatory towards those who take a responsible attitude. Indeed, such a policy could have racial overtones if we look carefully at large family structures in the UK.
So, child poverty is yet another chimera dreamt up by the left, to justify a nanny statist policy, and to find yet more ways to interfere in our everyday lives.
Posted by: George Hinton | June 15, 2007 at 10:45
Re the comment by VS: the comparison between lone parents and two-parent families is based on the DWP’s ‘Tax Benefit Model Tables’ (2006), available here. http://www.dwp.gov.uk/asd/asd1/TBMT_2006.pdf
The "Ministry of Truth’s" criticisms ignore this source. The DWP table used by Frank Field models the situation for lone parents paying £100 a week for childcare, not nearly £400 as the Ministry of Truth claims. For that reason it is not a valid rebuttal.
Posted by: Andrew Haldenby | June 15, 2007 at 14:32
what "abrtion sermons" as far as I can see they havne't mentioned god once when talking about defeining the weak!
very good piece very true
Posted by: outsider | June 15, 2007 at 15:50
Rather than flirting with Polly Toynbee and Greg Dyke, might it not be more useful to make overtures to Frank Field, given that his wisdom was rejected by his own party?
Posted by: Ken Stevens | June 16, 2007 at 12:14