New research highlights why tackling child poverty in the North East must be ‘”a top priority” for the next government, and for every general election candidate standing in the region, according to campaigners.
The analysis, carried out by Loughborough University for the End Child Poverty coalition, emphasises just how widespread disadvantage is for babies, children and young people across the North East, estimating that:
At least one in four children are growing up in poverty in a shocking 89% of the region’s 2024 general election constituencies. This compares with 66% of all constituencies across the UK. The rate is much higher in the ten constituencies now estimated to have the highest child poverty levels in the North East: These are:
- Middlesbrough and Thornaby East
- South Shields
- Newcastle Central and West
- Redcar
- Gateshead Central and Whickham
- Hartlepool
- Darlington
- Easington
- Bishop Auckland
- Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland
The report highlights the ‘extremely high’ correlation across the country – including in the North East – between the Westminster seats with the highest rates of child poverty, and those with the highest proportions of children affected by a policy known as the ‘two-child limit’.
In the new Middlesbrough and Thornaby East constituency – which today’s research finds has the highest child poverty rate in the region – almost one in five children (19%) are estimated to be living in a family impacted by the two-child limit. In the Hexham constituency, with the lowest child poverty rate in the North East, just 6% of children growing up in the area are affected by the policy.
Since its introduction in April 2017, the two-child limit has meant that almost all families having a third or subsequent child are no longer entitled to receive support for those children through Universal Credit. This means younger children missing out on around £66 per week in support that their older siblings receive. 59% of families hit by the two-child limit are in work.
It is calculated that scrapping this policy would be the most effective way to tackle child poverty, as it would lift 300,000 children out of poverty and mean a further 800,000 children living in less deep poverty across the country – at a cost of just £1.8 billion. It has been previously estimated that – beyond the immeasurable costs of poverty to individual children and families – the ‘wider societal costs’ of child poverty across the country are more than £39 billion per year.
Responding to today’s findings, incoming Chair of the North East Child Poverty Commission – Beth Farhat– said:
“This research really does lay bare the scale of disadvantage for children growing up in the North East, and emphasises why tackling child poverty has to be a top priority for every single candidate standing for election right across our region. No one should accept the life chances and opportunities of tens of thousands of children throughout the North East being restricted by poverty – nor the unsustainable pressures that rising levels of hardship have placed on public and voluntary sector organisations across our region – not least when we know that this can
change with political will, and the right policies and investment, in place.
“Whoever forms the next government must therefore make ending child poverty a top – and ongoing – priority too. This means all political parties committing to introduce a clear and evidence-led strategy to tackle child poverty, an immediate focus of which must be to end the two-child limit.”
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