Tory ministers are accused of presiding over a “national scandal” after damning new figures revealed 4.1million children are in poverty.
Stagnant wages and the cruel benefit freeze mean the huge total refused to fall – despite Theresa May’s pledge to fight “burning injustices” on her first day in Downing Street.
Annual Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) figures show 4.1million children were living in relative poverty after housing costs in 2017/18, around the same as the year before.
More than 2million (53%) are under five, up from 51% a year earlier. 700,000 children in “severe” poverty, up from 600,000. And the number of children in absolute poverty, a different measure, rose by 200,000 to 3.7million.
The Bishop of Durham, Paul Butler, said: “It is surely wrong, in a just and compassionate society, that so many children are growing up in poverty.
NEW: all the reaction – DWP child poverty figures a ‘national scandal’ as 4.1million kids are hithttps://t.co/LxX2Vutzv0
— Dan Bloom (@danbloom1) March 28, 2019