15 Asks for the Executive - Make and appointment to the Commission on Social Mobility and Child Poverty

In 15 Asks for the Executive we focus on a range of issues the current Executive can either complete or significantly progress before the June 2016 Assembly elections.

In this series of articles we take each 'ask' and explore them in greater details.

This week we are focusing on number seven "make an appointment to the Commission on Social Mobility and Child Poverty"

Anne Moore, co-chair, Child Poverty Alliance

Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission (SMCPC)

The time is long overdue to have Northern Ireland representation on the SMCPC, not least because child poverty levels are predicted to soar by 2020. The 2010 UK-wide Child Poverty Act sets targets to end child poverty by 2020 and contains provision for a child poverty commission with representation from all four nations. After the coalition government assumed power, the Child Poverty Commission was renamed the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission.

In its current form, the SMCPC monitors the progress of the London, Scottish and Welsh governments in improving social mobility and reducing child poverty, including against the targets in the Child Poverty Act 2010. It provides published advice to ministers (at their request) on how to measure socio-economic disadvantage, social mobility and child poverty. It also acts as an advocate for social mobility beyond government by challenging employers, the professions and universities, amongst others, to play their part in improving life chances

In Northern Ireland, the Child Poverty Alliance continues to urge the Executive to take action commensurate with the scale of the child poverty problem. According to the latest QUB PSE survey, more than half of children in Northern Ireland (241,000) are growing up in households that could not pay an unexpected expense of £500. One in three adults is unable to make regular savings of at least £20 and 28% cannot make regular payments into a pension because of lack of money; about 75,000 children are living in damp homes; over a third of families cannot afford one or more items central to a child’s family life – a week’s holiday away from home, a day trip once a month or celebrating special occasions. The number of families unable to afford at least one of four items for a child’s educational development has increased and these include children’s books, educational games, construction toys and school trips.

Many commentators have warned that welfare reform will have a disproportionate impact on low income families in Northern Ireland with JRF forecasting that welfare changes will compound the longstanding mental health problems, community divisions, deteriorating labour market and poverty levels in Northern Ireland. These warnings confirm the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) research, Child and Working-Age Poverty in Northern Ireland from 2010-2020, commissioned by Ofmdfm. The IFS has predicted that child poverty will increase across the UK, with the sharpest increase in income poverty among children in Northern Ireland.  Its latest update states that relative child poverty will increase to 26% (BHC) and absolute child poverty to 29.3% (BHC) by 2020.

Hence the options outlined in the Child Poverty Alliance’s recent report, Beneath the Surface, urging the Executive to develop a costed child poverty strategy and support inter alia quality jobs, a living wage, universal affordable childcare and independent welfare advice.  It also called for the retention of the IFS to continue monitoring child poverty levels, including the levels of persistent child poverty.

We would therefore urge representation on the SMCPC to add weight to these calls. The commission is chaired by Alan Milburn and includes members drawn from business, academia and the voluntary sector. Its work is important - for example, a  new report calls for social mobility and child poverty to be core business in the next Parliament.  It warns that it would be easy for the cross-party consensus on social mobility and child poverty to evaporate in the face of significant financial, economic and political headwinds. It calls on politicians of all parties to shore up that consensus or risk Britain becoming a permanently divided nation. In particular it calls on the parties to set out what action they would take in five priority areas:

  • Redeploying spending to maximise social progress
  • Restarting the twin engines of social mobility: Education and Housing
  • Realigning policy on the working poor
  • Refocusing on opening up the top of British society
  • Rebuilding a coalition in the country behind less poverty & more mobility

According to the SMCPC: ‘Urgent action and renewed energy is needed now if the challenges of the fiscal deficit and deep-seated changes in the labour and housing markets are not to result in Britain becoming a permanently divided nation.’

We commend these calls and urge representation from Northern Ireland to add our voice for a more equal society, free from child poverty.

 

Anne Moore, co chair of the Child Poverty Alliance

Share your COVID-19 support service

Organisations providing support to people and communities can share their service information here

> Share your support

Not a NICVA member yet?

Save time, money and energy. Join NICVA and you’ll be connecting in to a strong network of local organisations focused on voluntary and community activity.

Join Us

NICVA now welcomes all small groups for free.

Read more on...