It’s 10 years to the day that Tony Blair and Gordon Brown first promised to have halved child poverty by 2010, and guess what? The government needs to find at least £3billion more in tax credits and benefits to reach their predicted target. It seems like only last year (it was), that the then Chancellor Gordon Brown was promising sizeable increases in Working Tax Credit, and an above earnings increase in Child Tax Credit for 2008. Yet fast forward 12 months and the housing charity Shelter already show a 200,000 rise in UK children living below the poverty line.
This puts huge pressure on Chancellor Alistair Darling’s first budget today. Having just lost £500m due to additional fuel taxes being shelved till the Autumn, Mr. Darling is looking to put a sizable down payment on the money needed to halt child poverty. But any sum put forward will be a long way off the figure needed to keep up with the previous Labour governments pledge. Spokesperson for One Parent Families, Kate Bell, said:-
“We need evidence in this budget that Labour intend to keep their promise to halve child poverty by 2010. This may be tough spending for the government, but it’s much tougher for the 1.5 million poor children living in one-parent families.”
The Government look to be spending a large proportion of it’s child spending on families with disabilities. Over 30% of families with disabilities live below the poverty level, due to low benefits and lack of work. Currently all savings made by the Department of Work and Pensions goes straight back to the Treasury, but hopefully an agreement will be reached allowing them to keep some of the savings they accrue by finding work for the disabled. Current figures show that the Treasury gains £1.7m for every £1m spent by the Department of Work and Pensions on helping people into work.
Terry Rooney, leader of the Department for Works and Pensions, is calling for major changes in the benefits packages available for those deemed incapable of work in the long term. Although Mr. Darling appears to be pushing a large portion of his expendable budget towards the problem, is this just another firefighting exercise caused by the empty promises of yesteryear?
