People Before Profit Councillor Shaun Harkin has called for the scrapping of the Tory Party’s two-child limit in a bid to tackle Foyle’s 22.9 per cent child poverty rate.
He was responding to data released this week by the End Child Poverty Coalition and the NI Anti-Poverty Network documenting child poverty rates by constituency
Said the Foyleside councillor: “Damning child poverty rates exposed by the End Child Poverty Coalition are a call for urgent action.
“A staggering 22.9% of children in the Foyle area are living in poverty. This is more than one in five children. It’s not acceptable for a single child to be living in poverty and underscores the failure of the political establishment to prioritise tackling poverty.
“Almost 63% of children living in poverty across the North are in households with at least one adult working. This is a direct consequence of low-pay and the do-nothing attitude of those in charge amid a spiralling cost of living crisis.
“The report documents rising rental costs as a driving cause of increased child poverty.
“Private rental costs rocketed across the North by 10% over the last year, double the increase in England and Wales.
“All five of the main parties shamefully blocked an effort in the Assembly to freeze and reduce private rental costs before the DUP collapsed the Executive.
“People Before Profit fully back the central End Child Poverty Coalition demand to scrap the two-child benefit limit for those in receipt of Universal Credit.
“This callous Tory welfare reform was brought into the North by the DUP, Sinn Féin and Alliance despite widespread resistance.
“The two-child limit punishes families with more than two children and is a central cause of child poverty.
“Ending it will lift 250,000 children across Britain and the North out of poverty and bring 850,000 out of deeper poverty.
“We need to charge-up resistance to the Tory strategy of normalising massive levels of inequality. It’s not the case that nothing can be done.
“We urge the MP for Foyle and MPs from across the North to back the Westminster Early Day Motion calling for the scrapping of the two-child limit and to make a direct demand on the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to end this harmful policy.
“We cannot claim to be making progress when so many children in Derry and elsewhere are living in such dire circumstances.
“We won’t relent on challenging inequality while a single child from any background or any community is born into poverty.”
Tags: