Child Poverty Bill

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Freud, for his amendments, which seek, first, to focus the definition of socio-economic disadvantage on those non-income policy areas that he argued are the key drivers of poverty—namely, family breakdown, alcohol and drugs addiction, lack of education and skills, and persistent unemployment. The amendments seek, secondly, to broaden the focus of the strategy specifically to consider family breakdown and alcohol and drugs addiction. Along the way, the noble Lord pressed on the Government’s view of the definition of "socio-economic disadvantage" for the purpose of the Bill. Amendment 29 tries to particularise the definition of socio-economic disadvantage so that it is not limited to financial considerations and must include a consideration of family breakdown, alcohol and drug addiction, a lack of education and skills, and persistent unemployment. I reassure the noble Lord that we agree that socio-economic disadvantage should not be limited to financial considerations. Indeed, the duty in the Bill was included partly to balance the strategy so that it would not focus exclusively on income measures to meet the four largely income-related targets. However, particularising the definition to the extent that it is effectively limited to those four policy areas is not the right approach. There is no precise definition in the Bill of socio-economic disadvantage. However, we consider that it relates to a child’s access to material and social resources, and their ability to participate in society. A person who is affected by socio-economic disadvantage will be in an unfavourable economic and/or social position relative to someone else. Over the long term, lack of access to stimulating and enriching experiences and opportunities may adversely affect children’s development and well-being. As they grow up, this is likely to impact on their outcomes in key areas such as education, health, employment and income. The strategy includes provision to ensure that all children are covered by it, not only those in private households. I am afraid that I remain far from convinced that family breakdown and addiction are at the heart of tackling child poverty and that socio-economic disadvantage should refer explicitly to them. The noble Lord has made many assertions during our deliberations so far about the accuracy of the data underpinning the targets in the Bill, yet he needs to examine with his expert eye the statistics. Is he really contending that measuring family breakdown and addiction would be a more rigorous basis of evaluation than the ONS-approved HBAI data that we use for the targets? Research has shown that children are at increased risk of adverse outcomes following family breakdown and that negative outcomes can persist into adulthood. However, the difference between children from intact and non-intact families is small and the majority of them will not be adversely affected in the long term. Some children can benefit when it brings to an end a harmful family situation; for example, where there are high levels of parental conflict, including violence. As we have just touched on—and perhaps should not labour—we take the view that lone parenthood has only a small effect on poverty and child outcomes according to the best available evidence, although I am aware from our recent discussions that the noble Lord takes a different view. Meanwhile, we agree that actions to improve education, skills and employment are important. In preparation for the first child poverty strategy required under the Bill, we are producing a strategic direction paper that reviews the evidence base to help us understand causal pathways and identify how different sets of policies can contribute to the 2020 target. In doing so, we are considering a wide range of relevant data and statistics, including information around workless households and parental skill levels. I put it to noble Lords that it is not necessary to define "socio-economic disadvantage" in relation to these areas. Instead, it is better to follow our approach of naming policy areas in Clause 8(5) that must be considered in the UK strategy. I see no merit in the amendment and therefore urge the noble Lord to withdraw it. Turning to Amendment 35, Clause 8(5) requires the strategy to consider what measures, if any, ought to be taken across a range of key policy areas. These are referred to as the "building blocks". They have been determined through analysis of evidence that shows that they have the potential to make the biggest impact in tackling the causes and consequences of growing up in socio-economic disadvantage.