Child Poverty Bill

My Lords, my colleague, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester, spoke at Second Reading out of the Good Childhood report, which was co-written by the noble Lord, Lord Layard, for the Children’s Society. It described the current fiscal policy that increases the gulf between rich and poor, and the Government that have genuinely sought to bring people out of poverty, as absurd. It urged that by 2015 the proportion of children in relative poverty should be reduced from the 2006-07 figure of 22 per cent to the Scandinavian level of 10 per cent. While we talk in terms of vague figures, aims, targets and so on, it is better to have vague targets than no targets at all—although obviously I would prefer accurate ones. I shall speak particularly on Amendment 23, and I shall refer to some of the research being asked for in that amendment. Such research is already being carried out in Bradford, and some of the findings of the Born in Bradford project are due to be published in June. Born in Bradford is seeking to monitor the development of every child born in the district over a three-year period, beginning as near conception as possible and going through birth and infancy into childhood, and indeed beyond into adulthood. It is an enormous task; from memory, the number of children being studied approaches 14,000. There is something like an 80 per cent response from mothers and, in spite of what might be regarded as intrusive questions in the light of previous comments, even DNA samples of the babies are being collected—willingly. Born in Bradford is seeking to tie together medical, social and cultural factors that affect health and well-being. The premise behind it, which came up in all the applications for funding from the project, is that what happens to us in the womb and in the first couple of years of life influences our health when we are 40, 60 and way beyond. Trying to measure social deprivation is much harder, however, in minority ethnic groups. Assuming that the amendment goes through, the Secretary of State will need to take account of that. Ninety-five per cent of white mothers know their partner’s income but only 65 per cent of south Asian mothers do, and this skews the information. Born in Bradford is exploring other ways of measuring poverty, including looking at perceived poverty, but better measurements are needed. At the heart of our concern is the fact that poor maternal nutrition, pre-conception and post-conception, substantially increases the risk of poor cognitive abilities and serious brain disorders in the lives of many children. The unemployment benefit for women aged 18 to 25 is £50.95, and if she eats according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation minimum standards, which the noble Lord, Lord Freud, has already mentioned, she will spend £43 of this on food, leaving less than £8 for fuel, clothing and other necessities. That is the reality today. The value of this unemployment benefit has not increased in real terms since 1980. There has almost certainly been an increase in the proportion of ill people since then, and it has been costing the taxpayer billions through the National Health Service, through our schools and through the administration of justice. A few weeks ago, fortuitously, Sir Michael Marmot produced his report on health inequalities. He recommended that we give priority to prenatal and postnatal intervention that reduces adverse outcomes from pregnancy and infancy, that we establish a minimum income for the health of all people and that we reduce the social gradient in the standards of living through changes in fiscal policy. The report included a rather scary graph that showed that bright ladies who were rich and did well intellectually would continue to do well intellectually as they grew older; those who were less bright and poor were undeveloped mentally throughout their lives; those who were less bright but rich did better and better as they grew older, as their nutrition and other social conditions helped them to develop; and those who were bright as babies but poor gradually failed to develop in ways that they would have done if they had been rich. I mentioned this in my maiden speech so I hope that noble Lords will bear with me, but about three years ago I visited a school that has since become an academy, thanks to the funding that is available. I was there for prize-giving. The school served a particularly socially deprived, predominantly white area of Bradford. The then head teacher said to me, "Just look at the size of these children. They are all smaller than average. They are also underdeveloped intellectually, emotionally, socially and spiritually". I could see in those people—in the girls particularly, obviously—that the future cycle of deprivation and underachievement was simply going to continue in the lives of the people of a city that has among the highest levels of social deprivation. That is why I support Amendment 23.