What is child poverty in the UK?

XRAT

Poverty is difficult to put a financial value on until one knows the family circumstances, the benefits system is so easily 'manipulated'. The size of family, whether they have the opportunity to grow their own food, or have free housing and heat are all relevant.
What that money is spent on is more important, I see too many kids in what I would consider poverty, yet the family have a dog (and pay for T.V.)

McG_Clan

This is my personal opinion, and I think a lot of cases of 'child poverty' is down to reckless/irresponsible parenting where 'parent' they put themselves first and can't be bothered with properly caring for their child(ren).
Family income below £13,000 a year (60% of median income) - depends on how much/little is received in the way of benefits/tax credits etc. Is this before or after paying for utilities/rent/mortgage etc?
A lack of food, shelter or clothing - DEFINITELY but this can also be down to irresponsible parenting too
A child sharing a room with someone of different gender - Our health visitor told me my daughter wasn't allowed to share her brother's bedroom after he turned 8! Ha! Buy me a bigger house then!!! She wanted to share with him anyway, but since a little brother came along, she went in the tiny box room and the boys share.
Family income below £5,000 a year - again, depends on how much/little is received in the way of benefits/tax credits etc. Is this before or after paying for utilities/rent/mortgage etc?
Parents who are drug addicts - if the children are suffering due to the lifestyles of the parents, then yes
Parents regularly behind with paying household bills - not uncommon! Bills going up and wages static/falling, do the sums!
No TV - TV is a treat that everyone takes for granted, but we can all manage without? Mind you, I would miss my fave programs!
No annual holiday - we don't get an 'annual holiday' anyway! Can't afford and don't want two weeks on a beach baking ourselves ending up a grand or more in debt! We do days out on Tesco vouchers and deals on different websites, day out at the seaside building castles and collecting stones, days out at national trust sites (our Xmas present for us all from my parents is NT membership). My friend on benefits (with her 3 kids and partner) goes abroad a couple of times a year on holiday but we can't afford it! Where's the sense in that!?
No laptop or internet access - I have seen too many parents and teens on expensive mobiles/tablets who are on more benefits that we earn so this doesn't count in my book!
Kids that get free school meals - I think free school meals are important especially when this is the only benefit that goes to the child directly, monies can be diverted by 'parents' and go on booze etc. Not necessarily an indicator of poverty though.
A home with no central heating - My grandparents house only had coal fires. I grew up with it and loved it!
A home with no heating at all - Been there and done this last year - boiler/hot water/shower all packed up and we couldn't afford to replace for 9 months up to late November - repair was not an option as the boiler disintegrated! Made do with washes in the sink with hot water from the kettle. Used the showers at the leisure centre after kids swim lessons. Definitely inconvenient but lots of people are going without heating through the colder months to save money. Our thermostat is down to 15 in the colder months and we wear extra layers if just adults in the house. Thermostat at 17 and extra layers if kids are home.
Kids with fewer than two pairs of shoes - ha! My 3 kids have a pair of school shoes, trainers for PE/home and a pair of cheap croc type things. If crocs hadn't been invented, they'd just have 2 pairs of shoes! My eldest gets the new supermarket-brand-crocs in the sales then when he's outgrown them they get passed down. Same with trainers and school shoes that havent been worn out and fit properly. We do have new wellies to fit them all at the moment to bought off a local car boot for 50p a pair. Some kids at their school have about 7 pairs of shoes each!
A child without their own bed - my little guys always co-slept so didn't want their own bed. Also were happy to share with a brother/sister. They all now have a bed to themselves.
No access to school trips (though often schools will subsidise) - schools will always try to help subsidise or pay in full in most cases where they know the parents are misusing monies meant for the kids. I know of teachers who have done a whipround before now to send a kid on a residential trip when the school couldn't do anything as they were out of funds and the parents couldnt care less.

sastrugi_2

for young people today being without the internet is being poor
for others in their twenties and thirties it is probably not having holidays
but as i said in the title it is a relative thing - you may be poor by your standards but not at all by another country's standards, you may consider yourself to be the poor relation to richer friends but i agree that ultimately maslows hierarchy of needs is a basic starting point

Poverty covers more than basic need if families are to achieve good outcomes and I would say on behalf of single parents, a holiday can be something that keeps the family from breaking point.

paracelsus

Shocking that 28% of participants feel that househould income of less than £5000 a year is not poverty.
Who are these people so wrapped up in their own selfish wants,that they consider nothing of those less fortunate?
Having a poll at all just encourages nonsensical views being expressed.

weelizzie_2

The shower of !!!!!!!s in the current Government are clearly trying to re-assess what 'poverty' means as they continue to reduce the incomes of the already-poor.

Personally I think we should stick to an economic definition of 'poverty' in the UK tied to a percentage of median income. Otherwise cause and consequence get confused, and we introduce a whole range of factors with non-linear influence depending on geography/education/social circle etc.

tag1008

I live in a so called deprived area, where unemployment is rife, and a life on benefits is the culture. Children have no aspirations due to their selfish lazy parents, who continually have children for the purpose of child benefit and tax credits. i was made redundant last year, but have chosen to stay at home with my 4yr old who attends school each morning, and my husband works 50hrs a week for £19000 a year. i get limited child tax credits (reduction due to income) have my step son (age 15yrs) living with us, receive no maintenance from the absent mother (married to a millionaire so doesn't have to work/or pay) and get no other benefits. we pay full mortgage, council tax, utilities, insurances, run a car etc etc. We cannot afford a holiday (apart from when my parents take us away).Meanwhile my neighbours have 6 kids no wages, have 50inch flatscreen, run a people carrier, go on holidays, have a take away EVERY night, social care involvement so get free everything for the kids, including childminder to 'give them a break', sell dodgy DVD's, but those children have nothing in terms of care, love, warmth, dreams or clean clothes. They get to go on every school trip. Mine don't as i cant afford it. they have internet access...so do i, but there's was funded through the government. I pay for mine. I watch every penny, cannot save, and have to tell my children no. in my opinion, these families should have food/clothes vouchers, so the money is spent on the kids, not on their selfish parents, with cigarettes, alcohol and drugs. it makes me mad, as there is no need for these children to live this way. The middle income families struggle, because the rich get richer and the poor get all the benefits, being better off than 2 parent households with 1 parent earning. And if anyone tells me i should go and get a job... I'm no worse off than when i was earning £21000 yr as i no longer fork out for childcare or find the fuel to travel 150 miles everyday!Thats my rant over! LOL!:mad:

suzana22

As mentioned earlier - I think it's all relative. I work in a college where students have had to walk 3 miles to get in but can't claim EMA as 'the household' earn too much money but their parent drinks the money away. I've talked to students who say they have no money but admit to being able to spend £50+ a month on their mobile phone bill. ~I've a mum who earns the minimum wage and can't afford a Costa coffee everyday and a brother who's always behind on his mortgage payment but spends 3 nights a week down the pub! All of them would say they weren't in poverty!
Poverty is not having the basics needed for life, a bed, being warm and having food - as a child we only had 1 open fire in a 3 bed house (2 ad & 4 kids) and i remember having to get dressed in bed as it was sooo cold. I also remember my mum sealing the windows with cling film to keep the heat in..... but she said we were lucky!
my kids don't understand that there are children who go to sleep hungry, cold and afraid and if i lost my job tomorrow, i would try to make sure that they never do!
i empathise with the previous poster as we paid maintenance for a child who does not live with us to see them going to Florida every other year and us going on a Sun holiday!
life is sometimes not fair but maybe we should try and live without things to make us appreciate what we've got!

happyinflorida

I'm really shocked at the low number of people who haven't included no internet access - are people not aware that nowadays at school everything is done on the internet? My son's secondary school uses the internet for him to do his homework online. His teacher's send him emails regarding course work and to help with other things, they've also sent homework online. So what does a child do that hasn't got internet access?! Are that many people unaware of what goes on in schools nowadays?! That's shocking.

psdie

Vix79 wrote: »

I voted for an income under £13,000 a year (as well as no food, heating etc). I earn £12,000 a year, which after tax is around £890 a month. After rent, council tax, gas, electricity & water, I have under £60 a month for food, life insurance (to look after my child if anything happens to me), clothes (inc school uniform) and entertainment. I do receive tax credits on top of that, so I don't class myself as being in poverty, as I have enough to live on, we're warm & fed and have enough to go to the cinema every couple of months or so.

Congrats on making your cash last Vix What the poll fails to make clear though is the £13k is AFTER tax, housing costs, council tax and water have been deducted! So nearly £1.1k a month for food, elec, gas, that sort of thing - a massive improvement on your personal situation.

Poor - yes. "In poverty" - no, unless parents mismanage finances.

BNT

paracelsus wrote: »

Shocking that 28% of participants feel that househould income of less than £5000 a year is not poverty.
Who are these people so wrapped up in their own selfish wants,that they consider nothing of those less fortunate?
Having a poll at all just encourages nonsensical views being expressed.

Income is not necessarily a good measure of poverty as it only measures what is coming in, rather than what one already has. The value of one's assets is probably more relevant, as someone can be quite rich but not earning much at all. Some pensioners would all into that category (I agree that might not be the best example in a child poverty discussion).

I did tick the less than £5k box, because I do think that the majority of people earning less than that will be poor, but I can quite understand why others might think differently.