Will the Budget surprise be meeting the child poverty target?

TrevorsDen

4 billion ?

Well thats just small change really. Where from? Who cares? We can probably find that by picking stuff up from the pavement.

Why stop there. Does brown have any other pet projects? Ah world Poverty - lets borrow a few more bob for that.

David Ossitt

This is just about the silliest idea that this government keeps banging on about.

By all means try to reduce child poverty.

But stop trying to pretend that it can be ended; it can not, for a very simple reason, it is based on being below a certain average figure.

And so you will always have some who are less than average.

But it sounds nice; a bit like let's give more and more to Africa,

Hawkeye

Great idea! In the middle of a recession let's spend even more money. What kind of govt would subscribe to that idea? Oh yes..... sorry....

In any case it would not surprise me if you were right. It is the sort of "political positioning move" that Brown loves to pull and it satisfies his other apparent urge - to spray taxpayers' money around.

I do not think it will do him any good. Using children to "big up" smacks of a touch of the Selwyn-Gummers.

Beefburger anyone?

Forlornehope

It should be quite clear by now that the main problem of poverty in this country is not lack of money. Beveridge's fifth demon, idleness, is the problem. Throwing money at dysfunctional families has only made matters worse.

Tanuki

Brown/NuLab's relativistic definition of 'poverty' is something like 'living in a family with less than 50% of median disposable income'. By taxing us ordinary workers (as opposed to state-handout-recipients) more he's reducing median disposable income so can point to progress towards his target.

You don't cure relative poverty by impoverishing everyone. Unless you're a sociopath like Brown who sees 'levelling down' as a way to banish 'inequality'.

teledu

David Ossitt I suspect has it right in that the way "poverty" is calculated ensures there will always be some below this arbitrary poverty line. Perhaps the only way then to reduce poverty is to make everyone poorer starting from the top down - now that does sound a bit like Brownite economics.

David Bouvier

David Ossitt - not a fan of the concept, but strictly they talk about e.g. 60% of average (median) income. It is possible to have everyone above 60% of average.

richard

A few things, David the target is based on median income not average, so though challenging it is not impossible to meet in the mathematical sense that you suggest.

Hawkeye, putting cash into the hands of those who will spend it immediatly rather than save it would be considered by most economists as a very appropiate fiscal policy during a recession.

Ben Elford

As has been said so often, this is all meaningless. 'Poverty' is a relative, not an absolute term; 'lifting out of child poverty' can be achieved by raising a statistic above an arbitrary level by as little as one penny; children on the whole don't have money anyway (apart from pocket money). Why should anyone be taken in by this nonsense?

David Ossitt

Forlornehope

Well said.

David Ossitt

David Bouvier and
richard

Gentlemen; thank you, I do understand the concept but I am still of the opinion that the poor will always be with us.

Only a charlatan like Gordon would try to tell us that poverty can and will be eradicated.

Pete

I am all for helping the needy but, really, 'poverty'? From what I can see most of Nulab defined 'poor' are on what used to be described as lower middle class incomes...

Susan Hill

It is the dependency attitude that needs to be eradicated. Many young people now are growing up in families where nobody has worked for 3 generations and as long as there is no incentive to do so and no ambition to heave yourself out of the mire, the attitude will harden. And of course right now it`s easy to repeat the mantra 'I`d get a job only there aren`t any.' If parents and grandparents have no work ethic and are happy to exist on handouts then they will wait to be 'lifted out of poverty' by someone else.
Oh and one simple way of getting more money to those who, we are told, need it, would be to give extra benefit to those who do not smoke, paid for by taking it from those who do. At over a fiver a packet, a packet a day minimum, you do the Math.

Pedant

Ending child poverty can be met by this measure.

The aim is to raise families over 60% of the median, which strictly speaking is not an average.... so why don't we applaud an ambitious aim that is agreed upon by all political parties, not just Labour.

Procharity

Richard's right - putting £4bn into the hands of people who won't save it but will buy food and clothes, etc. has got to be a good idea for the economy.
Btw, why the venom against the poor? I know who I blame for eating up £60bn from my taxes and it isn't the poor. Strangely, it isn't the Chancellor either.

Forlornehope

I suspect that the long term way to reduce child poverty involves a combination of a bit of discomfort combined with real opportunities. Kids need to grow up thinking that they don't want their's to put up with what they had to. They also need the opportunity for entry to good trades or professions where they can "better themselves". That's a Victorian term and none the worse for it. No one should be left hungry but equally kid's need to see that idle parents are letting them down.

John Lea

Forlornehope: I agree with you, but our spineless, mealy-mouthed politicians never will, because they realise that if they echoed your views publicly they would be howled down by the Polly Toynbee brigade and accused of being elitist and uncaring.

I wish politicians and children's charities would use direct language re this issue: for 'alleviating child poverty' read 'subsidising layabout parents'.

Savale

Back to school David Ossit!

You have mixed up the median and the mean.

The poverty line is based on the median income, not the mean (average) income.

It perfectly within the bounds of mathematical possibilty to have zero households below 60% of the mean. Ask anyone who passed GCSE maths with a decent grade!

Ben Elford - a line has to be drawn somewhere to measure and drive progress. 60% median income has been shown by research to be a reliable proxy for when material deprivation becomes apparent. So why not use that? Besides which, as is frequently stated, the government uses a basket of measures that include a material deprivation survey, an absolute measure and a persistent low income measure. Do try and keep up!

If other European countries can achieve 95% of families above 60% median income, there is no reason we cannot. The naysayers who always try to make out Britain will only fail where others have succeeded drive me nuts.

Where is your patriotism? British people can do this for our children!

procharity

You surely aren't calling the hundreds of thousands of parents losing their jobs in the recession and falling into poverty "idle" and "layabout"?

It's time to move beyond gut prejudice and look at the world as it is: we're in the mire, there aren't enough jobs and the recession will make child poverty worse.

Retraining and job creation measures are important but won't work overnight if at all. Whether you call it ending child poverty or reducing family misery, families more than ever need state support - that is, benefits - to stop them going under.

Verity

If you don't have a mobile phone and a pair of the latest trainers, that is regarded as child poverty. No one's starving in Britain. The rest is up to them.

I agree with Susan Hill.

Also, everyone in Britain is too comfortable, including the leeches with their wall TVs, ciggies, beer and lottery tickets.

I say again: food stamps for food - copy the American method of management; it's been working for 30 years and the Americans are good at methodology (as well as just about everything else, it must be said). Second, an idea I haven't seen anywhere else but in my own head, but government minted tokens for non-food items like detergents, soap, toothpaste, etc.

That's it.

Keep them alive and clean until they find work. Why the taxpayer would be funding someone else's idle, parasitic lifestyle has always baffled me.

If they can't have beer, cigarettes, lottery tickets and money for petrol, clothes they will be motivated to find work.

I would also suggest hostels, or dormitories with secure bedrooms and two or three common rooms with TV on each floor, and two or three kitchens and bathrooms.

Once they're in work, they could apply for a council flat. But only once employed with the ability to pay the rent. This way, they are motivated to pull themselves out of poverty.

John Lea

procharity: of course I'm not suggesting that parents who have recently lost their jobs are 'idle', but surely you must recognise that very few people in Britain today are living in genuine poverty. What we have are a feckless underclass who choose to live a bestial existence - not only that, but they expect the working population to subsidise their lifestyle indefinitely.

Difficult as it may be for some people to accept, child poverty IS a welfare issue, and we should not let sentimentality get in the way of our judgement.