Labour MP angry at levels of child poverty in his constituency

A Cheshire MP is angry after learning almost 4,200 children are living in poverty in his constituency.

Mike Amesbury was commenting on research by the End Child Poverty Coalition showing 24.2% of children in his Weaver Vale constituency were in poverty in 2019/20 or 4,175 individual young people.

And the study, compiled even before the impact of the pandemic, revealed youngsters in poverty across the UK totalling 4.3 million and rising.

The Labour MP said: “It both breaks my heart and makes me angry because there is no excuse for this given we have the fifth biggest economy on the planet.

“Poverty holds people back in every aspect of life; from their physical and mental health, their education, career and earning potential, relationships, life expectancy and general quality of life.

“When someone does not have the opportunity to fulfil their potential it’s sad for that person but also means we are not making the most of our pool of talent as a nation.”      

Other statistics show certain council wards disproportionately impacted, with 32.6% of children living in poverty at Windmill Hill, Runcorn, and 28.8% at neighbouring Halton Lea.  There are hotspots in Northwich, with 17% of children in Leftwich and 18% in Witton living below the breadline.

Mike added: “We know that low wages and Zero Hours contracts mean poverty is now all too common among working families as evidenced by the rise in the number of people using food banks.

“Any Government with a moral compass should want to tackle child poverty. Unfortunately, you have a mainly privately educated Tory cabinet who don’t know what it means to go hungry.

It’s a sad indictment of 11 years of Conservative Government that almost a quarter of the children in my constituency are living in poverty despite grand talk of ‘levelling up’.

“Previous Labour administrations made considerable strides but now we’re going backwards. We would scrap the two-child limit on benefits, retain the £20 uplift in Universal Credit and invest in early years provision, particularly for ages 0-5.”

Anna Feuchtwang, chair of the End Child Poverty Coalition, said: “The figures speak for themselves – the situation for children couldn’t be starker. We all want to live in a society where children are supported to be the best they can be, but the reality is very different for too many.”

End Child Poverty is a coalition of 70 charities, unions, faith groups, community-based organisations and professional bodies. The research, carried out by Loughborough University, shows levels of child poverty before the pandemic for every constituency across the UK, after housing costs have been taken into consideration.

You can read and download the full report and access the data at:

Child poverty in your area 2014/15 – 2019/20 – End Child Poverty

Here’s a link to the website of the group behind the main research:

www.endchildpoverty.org.uk