Children’s charity leaders call on Boris Johnson to tackle child poverty as Covid-19 ‘wreaks havoc’ on families’ lives

Leading children’s charities warn more families likely to be swept into poverty under new restrictions

Prime minister warned that this winter will be ‘a time of financial worry and hunger’ for many children across Britain, with even more families likely to be swept into poverty as a result of the new national lockdown restrictions

The prime minister is being urged to tackle the “endemic problem” of child poverty in the UK, with leading charities warning that the already mounting issue has been exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic.  

In a letter to Boris Johnson, six of the UK’s largest children’s charities warned that this winter would be “a time of financial worry and hunger” for many children across Britain, with even more families likely to be swept into poverty as a result of the new national lockdown restrictions.

The number of children in poverty in the UK has surged by 600,000 in the last seven years, accounting for 4.2 million youngsters — around three in 10 children — according to the latest official figures.

While there are no official statistics measuring how this has changed since the pandemic started, charities said that job losses, along with increased expenses due to children not being in school for a long period, meant low-income families had been disproportionately affected.

The signatories, who include the Children’s Society, Barnardo’s and the NSPCC, said they took encouragement from the public’s support for Marcus Rashford’s campaign for free school meal provision during the school holidays, but warned that effectively tackling poverty and inequality required an “overarching approach, including but not limited to free school meals”. 

“As children’s charities delivering services in communities across the country, we see, at first hand, the case for investment in children’s services, early help for families and holistic work to tackle all forms of neglect and abuse,” the letter states.

“We also see harm caused by ‘digital poverty’, which means poorer children miss out on education and access to support. We know these challenges are especially acute for children from Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities.  

“The debate has also underlined the vital contributions of civil society. These challenges are too complex for any agency to solve alone, and we need to work together.”

They said Mr Johnson’s personal pledge to ensure that no child goes hungry this winter and can access a healthy meal "must translate into action”, and that the simplest way of addressing this would be to extend free school meals to all eligible children in school holidays.

Calling on the prime minister to make the pandemic a “catalyst for real change”, the charities said he must also permanently extend free school meals provision to all children whose families receive universal credit and those without recourse to public funds, as well as maintaining the £20 uplift to universal credit.

Mark Russell, chief executive of the Children’s Society, said the growing child poverty levels were “unacceptable” and called on the government to “act now”.  

“The prime minister talks of building back better, we want him to prove this is more than just a slogan. Children must be put at the heart of recovery and we would urge him to move forward with our suggestions to tackle the endemic issues of poverty.” 

It comes after Mr Johnson was reprimanded by the UK's statistics watchdog in July for repeatedly making inaccurate and misleading claims about the government's record on child poverty.

The Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) said figures used by the prime minister were incorrect after he claimed a huge fall 400,000 fall in the number of families of children in poverty since 2010.

Anna Feuchtwang, chief executive of the National Children’s Bureau, which also signed the letter, accused ministers of being “in denial” and “using data selectively to avoid addressing the problem”.

“Families must be able to feed their children without losing their dignity and for that to happen the government must invest in proper social security,” she added.

Barnardo’s chief executive Javed Khan said: "The Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated deep-rooted inequalities in our society, and threatens to set vulnerable children back further.  

“The crisis is wreaking havoc on children’s mental health and wellbeing, putting more at risk at home, online and in the community, and means more families face a winter struggling to pay for food and fuel.  

“Today’s young generation face extremely complex challenges, and the pandemic must be a catalyst for real change.”

Echoing his remarks, Becca Lyon, head of child poverty at Save the Children, said: “It's clear we need a long-term plan to tackle child poverty. It's also clear that action is needed now.”

A government spokesperson said: “We are committed to making sure every child gets the best start in life, and this is central to our efforts to level up opportunity across the country.  

“That’s why we have raised the living wage, ended the benefit freeze and funded free childcare in addition to allowing up to 85 per cent of childcare costs to be claimed back on universal credit. This is on top of £9.3bn extra welfare support during the coronavirus pandemic.”