More than half of children are growing up in poverty in some constituencies within the UK, according to a new ”child poverty map”.

The map, created by the End Child Poverty coalition, shows considerable variation, with just one in 10 children growing up in poverty in those constituencies where deprivation is lowest. 

The estimated figures show that some of the most deprived areas of the UK have seen the biggest increases in child poverty since the last local child poverty figures were recorded in December 2015. Increases of 10 percentage points in some areas demonstrate “the growing crisis of child poverty in the UK”, the coalition warned. 

The coalition is calling on Chancellor Philip Hammond to end the freeze on children’s benefits - currently in place until the end of the decade - so that families no longer see living standards squeezed as prices rise.

A child is said to live in poverty if they are in a family living on less than 60 per cent of median household income.

According to the map, child poverty is highest in large cities, particularly in London, Birmingham and Manchester.

Among the 20 parliamentary constituencies with the highest levels of childhood poverty, seven are located in London, three in Birmingham and three in Manchester. 

Among local authorities, Tower Hamlets in London has the highest percentage of children in poverty (53 per cent), while the lowest is the Isles of Scilly (5 per cent).

Benefits freeze ‘a major factor’

“It is scandalous that a child born in some parts of the UK now has a greater chance of growing up in poverty than being in a family above the breadline,” said Sam Royston, chair of End Child Poverty and director of policy and research at the Children’s Society. “There can be little doubt that the government’s policy of maintaining the benefits freeze, despite rising prices, is a major contributor to the emerging child poverty crisis.”

The coalition also highlighted the damaging impact of the “poverty premium” - the fact that low-income families can end up paying as much as £1,700 per year more than better-off families to buy the same essential goods and services, in large part because of the higher cost of credit. 

Mr Royston called on the chancellor to “invest in interest-free credit for low-income families, to ensure that poverty doesn’t result in spiralling debt”. 

Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, commented: “These are shocking figures. It is nothing short of a disgrace that, in one of the wealthiest countries on Earth, there are constituencies where more than half of children are growing up in poverty.”

A government spokesperson said: “The best route out of poverty is through employment, and since 2010 an extra 3 million more people are now in work and 600,000 fewer children are living in workless households. But we recognise that budgets are tight, and that’s why we’re helping families keep more of what they earn.

“We’ve doubled free childcare - worth £5,000 per child each year - while our £2.5 billion pupil premium programme is supporting 2 million disadvantaged schoolchildren across the country.”

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