New statistics out today show very limited progress towards lifting children out of poverty, three years on from the Child Poverty Reduction Act being introduced, says Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG).
The Child Poverty statistics for the year ending June 2021 show very small progress on some measures, and none on others. The picture is especially bleak for the tens of thousands of children with disabilities or living with a disabled parent, who experience the highest rates of material hardship, while Māori and Pacific children continue to experience unchanged, and very high rates on all poverty measures.
“Clearly the discriminatory policies which trap these children in the worst poverty need to be changed” says CPAG spokesperson Professor Emeritus Innes Asher. “We share a responsibility to make sure no child has to endure the harms of poverty. Showing compassion as a society means making sure every child in this country has the same chances in life.”
“Since the Child Poverty Reduction Bill was enacted in 2018, there has been a little improvement, but now progress has stalled,” Professor Asher says. “Not going backwards is not good enough for our tamariki. Each day, each week and each month counts for children, they cannot wait. The Government needs to get on with the job.”
Today’s poverty figures do not capture the 2021 Covid-19 lockdown restrictions, which placed financial pressure on already-struggling families. With the Omicron surge now hitting communities, children and families in poverty are more desperate than ever, and yet have been invisible in Government’s pandemic policy responses, says CPAG.
“Given the lag in this data, what’s happening today for our children is not sufficiently captured. Rents and household costs have gone up significantly in the past year and foodbank demand demonstrates that the Government is falling in its duty to children,” Professor Asher says.
“While material hardship rates have lowered a bit over the last 3 years for some groups, we suspect that private charity has played a significant role in filling some of the gaps left by the government. Systemic, sustained increases in income for low-income families are needed, rather than reliance on private charity which cannot make enough difference.”
CPAG calls on the Government to immediately bring forward the promised benefit increases, lift income support levels and to ensure all low-income families are eligible for all Working for Families payments such as the In-Work Tax Credit.
Isn’t this Jacinda Ardern’s portfolio?
If she’s not embarrassed she should be.
She said amongst other election promises she would fix this.
She also said she would fix the housing crisis, which is the biggest contributor to poverty for those who don’t own a house, while also making homeowners a great deal wealthier.
Absolutely Ada,
” The Government needs to get on with the job ”
It is by making the wealthiest top twenty even richer , Denying thousands of people their right to a warm safe dry home they can own that will supplement their pension like it used to do , refusing to reform a seriously unbalanced unfair tax system that should be taxing corporates including tech giants to pay their fair share towards supporting the structural economy that delivers for all not just the few.
Poverty will never be reduced while the main parties continue to adhere to neo liberal economics.
Poverty is entrenched and will remain that way as long as people are poorly paid , overtaxed , non unionised and never have the opportunity to own a home to help provide security when they retire like so many of the monied property class.
People enslaved are freed eventually but not without consequences.
LINOs don’t do ‘policy’
One of the biggest opportunities to hold the government to account for results on child poverty (3 year targets) has passed by with little comment as the media are distracted.
Jacinda Ardern said “Despite COVID-19 causing the greatest global economic downturn since the Great Depression the Government has delivered reductions in child poverty across all nine measures,” The government claimed there were “ 66,500 children being lifted out of poverty and the Government [was] meeting the first round of child poverty targets on two of the three primary measures.”
BUT after two years of pandemic, the social indicators such as housing stress, dramatically increased foodbank use, increasing debt, and excess demand for social services and charities indicate widespread low-income family distress. Worse can be expected with an Omicron surge in 2022.
Something doesnt add up
” BUT after two years of pandemic, the social indicators such as housing stress, dramatically increased foodbank use, increasing debt, and excess demand for social services and charities indicate widespread low-income family distress. Worse can be expected with an Omicron surge in 2022.
Something doesn’t add up ”
Adern Robertson and her colleagues are New Labour ( neo liberal compassionate conservatives ) who want to solve neo liberal crises with more neo liberal medicine without realising that it will never work despite their joining the neo liberal Labour party to pretend they care about the victims of neo liberal economics that will never be helped by rich men’s economics no matter how much they think they might care.
They have failed before they even started.