What counts as child poverty in the UK? Poll discussion

BigMummaF

Jacks_xxx wrote: »

Insisting that we only use the word "poverty" in its most basic literal sense is too rigid to apply to children in this country.

Using the absolute poverty definition of "no clothes, no food, no home" is useless because it doesn't apply to any child in this country.

Even the naked hungry abused ones have a home.

Even the homeless ones have clothes on.

If the absolute definition is useless, then we need a relative one.

To establish a consensus about what that should be, we need to ask people's opinions.

What is normal for child in this country?

What is an unacceptable level of deprivation for a child in this country which means that they are impoverished by comparison?

If we only accept the absolute definition of poverty then WooHooooooo! :j, no child in the UK is living in absolute poverty!!!! :j....

Thank you..that's what I was trying to say in my clumsy, ham-fisted way. We have the luxury of freedom to express our PERSONAL opinions & that is all we are doing on this thread, surely

It could be--& definitely is on here!--argued that poverty does not exist in this country. So why then are they continually talking about "fuel poverty" on the tv? Or the elderly living in "poverty" & families below "the bread-line"? OK perhaps some would change the word being used in this poll, but I think we are all intelligent enough to get the gist of the meaning in this context.

Everyone has a different understanding of any given issue & some chose to adhere to the letter of official definition whilst others chose to see them only as guidelines. Social workers come under fire for missing what appears (after the event) to be obvious signs of child abuse but what constitutes abuse?

We each have our own way of interpreting the information presented & it is particularly difficult to convey emphasis in the written word. I may read that a CAT is sitting on my mat, where you may see the cat is sitting on MY mat..that sort of thing. Just look at the government & its notorious forms--you will give true & honest answers as you have understood the question, but the office will say you've got it wrong; ask a group of people for advice & they all give you a different answer; look for a route to a new destination & find five alternatives. That is also WHY child poverty is very real in the UK but perhaps masquerading under another moniker.

dekaspace wrote: »

Ok I grew up in a very poor family, and though we had some things like maybe a tv, or a video recorder that didnt mean we werent in poverty so to speak.

The only reason my dad had those things as he did learned to fix things cheaply or free so a TV that would of been over £100 second hand back then would of been fixed for about £10 and used for years, a video recorder costing over £200 new would be donated by a friend broken and fixed for £10 then we had entertainment for the family!

And sure my dad could smoke a pack or two of cigarettes each week but my mum didnt smoke, neither drank alcohol and we often walked miles to shops and could cook a meal for a family of 4 for under a £1(still can) so we werent in poverty just a very very uncomfortable lifestyle barely making ends meet, huge damp in the house, never being able to decorate(and living in the house 15 years with the wallpaper flaking off when you moved in says something!) getting donated furniture etc.

So because we had something we werent considered in poverty despite living a ok lifestyle....

This is a very good example of people's assumptions when they only see a pinch of the whole picture! We have a new tv, but The Offspring's dad SIZE=1]we're separated[/SIZE has given it to them for crimbo. I have bought a new cooker, but I had to save for four years & my family donated towards it for my birthday & Christmas gifts (not that I mind, as flowers make me sneeze & I could do with not eating calorific choccies )

Yesterday No2 Offspring was moaning about it being cold & why couldn't the heating be turned up, so I let rip with both barrels! As a child, we lived in a 2-bed 'cottage' & only ever had a coal fire lit in the downstairs back room. Our bath was in the kitchen, the loo outside next to the coal-shed & the "fridge" was a wooden crate with a wire mesh door & tiny square of marble, hung high on the garden wall to keep dairy stuff cool. Our holidays were spent visiting grandparents as Dad got a rail ticket once a year as a work 'bonus' & we didn't have a car until I was 9 or 10, so how does my early life look in terms of deprivation?

I guess then that "poverty" is relative to what is an acceptable standard of living for the times you are currently in & as such will always contain altering criteria, thus making a 'one size fits all' rule book an impossibility.

BigMummaF

Jacks_xxx wrote: »

Disposable income doesn't increase quite that fast but it has increased massive amounts in my lifetime.

Unfortunately the cost of living has too....

The poorest are always the poorest even if they are comparatively better off than people a hundred years ago or people in the third world.

I always thought the 'disposable' part of your income was what was left after you had paid essential bills like housing & utilities. After all, you are charged for being connected to the mains before you can switch on an energy-saving 3 watt light bulb!
As you say the cost of living is considerably higher with various taxes & things so as I understand it, there is a lot less income left over for food & personal care. Even when you use charity shops/ car boot/ jumble sales etc, the money still has to be there for you to buy the essentials like underwear & a pair of shoes with less holes than you have at present.

Maldecul

Jacks_xxx wrote: »

Disposable income doesn't increase quite that fast but it has increased massive amounts in my lifetime.

Unfortunately the cost of living has too.

So the same number of children are living in poverty. (More actually.)

30 years ago, £20k was a well off person's salary, and a family home in my town was £3k.

Now £20k is not enough to live on in many parts of the country and a family home in my town is £300k.

The poorest are always the poorest even if they are comparatively better off than people a hundred years ago or people in the third world.

I suspect that most of us are familiar with the basics of inflation, and could, I am sure, quote our own anecdotes, however, that misses the point.

Furthermore, going on to assert that there are more children living in poverty without stating the measure that is being applied seems to ignore the topic of the debate altogether.

nutsohazelnuts

Bella56 wrote: »

Apparently my children are living in poverty.... goodness, they seem rather well-fed, well-dressed in their Ebay secondhand clothes, and well-nurtured. But, no separate rooms, and a host of other apparently unbearable circumstances.

Would you care to elaborate on this for us? I find your cheerful assertion that your children live in poverty and are well fed and well dressed rather disconcerting and baffling and fear that I may have got the wrong end of the stick here.

rickbonar wrote: »

Yes as my mum recalled her schooldays where some children never had any shoes in England in the 20 th century.

Let us hope we never have to go back to those days. Surely all our progress is for nothing if we cannot at least keep our children's feet shod in wintertime.

Jacks_xxx

Maldecul wrote: »

I suspect that most of us are familiar with the basics of inflation, and could, I am sure, quote our own anecdotes, however, that misses the point.

Does it? How?

Maldecul wrote: »

Furthermore, going on to assert that there are more children living in poverty without stating the measure that is being applied seems to ignore the topic of the debate altogether.

Oh I'm sorry. My reply was to your post about the measure we have all been talking about throughout this thread - and I was using that same measure.

adouglasmhor

nutsohazelnuts wrote: »

Would you care to elaborate on this for us? I find your cheerful assertion that your children live in poverty and are well fed and well dressed rather disconcerting and baffling and fear that I may have got the wrong end of the stick here.

The person you were replying to was applying the examples in the original post. Sorry you are confused maybe you should start at the beginning then it would be clear?

nutsohazelnuts

adouglasmhor wrote: »

The person you were replying to was applying the examples in the original post. Sorry you are confused maybe you should start at the beginning then it would be clear?

Thank you. I thought that was the case but wondered how many of them she was applying to her own situation.

Hastobe_Katt

Jacks_xxx wrote: »

No, that's a whole other thread. This thread is about what poverty is.

This all seems a pretty pointless debate then.

Jacks_xxx wrote: »

Either strategy will cost money.

Education, support, social work and the care system cost much much more per child than the benefits system.

Yes but simply throwing money at a home situation when poverty is not the problem is a completely pointless exercise.

Jacks_xxx wrote: »

I'm not sure what you're getting at there?

Everybody pays tax.

Not just "those who don't have a huge amount more themselves."

I do wish the low paid paid less tax - does this mean we agree on something?

But we all have to pay for the possibility that we may need the NHS the benefits system, fire fighters, police officers and roads some day, don't we?

A minimum wage family will be in receipt of some benefits themselves, and are unlikely to pay enough tax each year to even cover their own benefits, let alone subsidise anybody else's!

Simples - we have limited and shrinking resources to throw at the problem. It's unfair to tax working families in order to throw money at families who are not poor by any realistic definition of the term.

The relative definition of poverty just creates a spiral that needs more and more funds to support. Why should a family sitting on their !!!!!! and drawing dole automatically get an increase in their weekly money because another percentage of the population are working their wotsits off to better themselves.

As for the last paragraph - am I not alone in thinking what a crazy system we have? Why do we take tax off low income families to give it back as tax credits? (Other than to keep a raft of civil servants in employment of course!) Its a shame we can't have the French system - if your income is low enough to need top up it's low enough not to pay tax and tax allowances (not benefits!) are based on the size of your family. I.e. to benefit from them you have to have taxable income viz work. So no incentive to become a benefit baby machine.

KimYeovil

The fundamental point remains - all agree that children should be provided with A through L. And we also know that almost all families do have access to sufficient funds that can provide A through L (apart from J (separate rooms)) and that is why the survey falls apart into uselessness (and potential emotional blackmail and political abuse).

M is an indicator that the family is not in poverty - as it is a means-tested allowance then this indicates the family qualifies to receive everything and is rolling in it.

Hastobe_Katt

KimYeovil wrote: »

The fundamental point remains - all agree that children should be provided with A through L. And we also know that almost all families do have access to sufficient funds that can provide A through L (apart from J (separate rooms)) and that is why the survey falls apart into uselessness (and potential emotional blackmail and political abuse).

I agree. I find it very disingenuous when families say they can't afford some of the items on the above list. Maybe they were a luxury a few years ago but you can pick up a second PC that is perfectly ok for surfing the net for well under £100. Likewise holidays are dirt cheap nowadays. https://www.hostelworld.com has 4 bed rooms in places like Poland, Hungary, CZ etc for £5 pppn including breakfast (with kitchens so you can prepare food). Flights to these locations are as little as £30 return. Even if you have to pay someone £20 petrol money each way to and from the airport you are still talking about £320 for a week for a family of 4. Putting it into perspective that's the equivalent of a packet of fags a week or 6 months Sky subscription. UK caravan holiday deals via the Sun etc are cheaper still.

As kids we had camping holidays in a second hand tent. My mum put aside a small amount each week to cover food and we paid relatives the petrol money to take us to the campsite and pick up us. Christmas presents were hand made or renovated second hand stuff...bought with the proceeds from selling off older outgrown toys and hidden in suitcases under my parents bed while they were fixing them up. I still treasure those presents - because they were real. Clothes were second hand / hand me downs. The arrival of jeans was a free for all - the first to grab got them...whether or not they fitted! The three of us (two girls and a boy) shared one small bedroom with my younger brother in with my parents. Our room was so small there was no space to walk between the beds - I had to climb over my brother and sister's beds to get to my bed. No central heating - just a coal fire in the lounge. I can remember lying in bed seeing ice on the insides of the window and my breath on the air, planning the fastest route to my clothes and the bathroom!! Mum used to make meals from things like pig's trotter, corned beef pancake, liver and onions, eggs, lentils and other cheap but nutritious foods. She was unbelievable at making money stretch. Nevertheless, I would defy anyone to say we were deprived. We had a fantastic childhood.