Lord Bird

The Child Poverty Taskforce continues its urgent work to publish the Child Poverty Strategy and is exploring all available levers across government to deliver an enduring reduction in child poverty in this parliament, as part of a 10-year Strategy for lasting change.

As set out in the publication of 23 October ‘Tackling Child Poverty: Developing our Strategy’, the Taskforce is exploring a range of metrics and will make decisions alongside the publication of the strategy. This work will be guided by the leading, and internationally recognised, measure of poverty - Relative Poverty After Housing Costs (the proportion of families with below 60% of the median income after housing costs are deducted).

Our metrics must also reflect the experience of poverty in households across the UK and the urgent need to focus on those children experiencing the most severe and acute forms of poverty. The Taskforce will consider how best to measure this as the strategy develops, including through our work on the material deprivation measure following the recent review of the material deprivation survey questions carried out by the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

The Child Poverty Taskforce continues its urgent work to publish the Child Poverty Strategy and is exploring all available levers across government to deliver an enduring reduction in child poverty in this parliament, as part of a 10-year Strategy for lasting change.

As set out in the publication of 23 October ‘Tackling Child Poverty: Developing our Strategy’, the Taskforce is exploring a range of metrics and will make decisions alongside the publication of the strategy. This work will be guided by the leading, and internationally recognised, measure of poverty - Relative Poverty After Housing Costs (the proportion of families with below 60% of the median income after housing costs are deducted).

Our metrics must also reflect the experience of poverty in households across the UK and the urgent need to focus on those children experiencing the most severe and acute forms of poverty. The Taskforce will consider how best to measure this as the strategy develops, including through our work on the material deprivation measure following the recent review of the material deprivation survey questions carried out by the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

National Health Service organisations must ensure that all patients have equitable access to care, and that decisions or policies do not unfairly disadvantage people or lead to an increase in inequalities. All NHS organisations are legally obliged to not discriminate.

This means that although we promote digital first services to those who choose to use them, a non-digital solution should be available for those patients who cannot or do not wish to engage digitally to ensure continued, equitable access to care.

These non-digital routes must be available for all services provided by NHS organisations.

We are working to improve access to digital services, outcomes, and experiences for the widest range of people, based on their preferences. Digital health tools should be part of a wider offering that includes face-to-face support with appropriate help for people who struggle to access digital services.

The Public Health Grant supports local authorities to deliver vital public health services that focus on reducing preventable illnesses through services such as smoking cessation, drug and alcohol addiction treatment and recovery, health visiting, and sexual health clinics. Public Health Grant allocations are weighted heavily towards deprivation, with per capita funding for the most deprived local authority more than two times greater than that for the least deprived.

More than £13.4 billion will be consolidated into the Public Health Grant to local authorities, and a retained business rates arrangement with Greater Manchester local authorities, over the next three years beginning in 2026/27. This is a 5.6% total cash increase over the period, on top of 5.5% cash growth in 2025/26.

The National Health Service also funds important public health services, including national screening and immunisation programmes. In doing so, NHS England has regard to the need to reduce inequalities both in access to services and in health outcomes.

The Department commissions research through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). Research recently completed and funded by the NIHR Oxford Health Biomedical Research Centre has found that socioeconomic inequalities in children’s mental health are evident by age five and persist throughout childhood and adolescence. Further information is available at the following link:

https://oxfordhealthbrc.nihr.ac.uk/study-finds-socioeconomic-inequalities-in-childrens-mental-health-are-evident-by-age-five/

The Government is committed to raising the healthiest generation of children ever. We know that a child’s early experiences shape their lifelong physical, emotional, and social development. Inequalities, such as poverty, can have a long-lasting impact on children’s health. For example, childhood obesity is strongly linked to deprivation and an increased risk of obesity in later life. Research suggests that any exposure to poverty during childhood is associated with worse physical and mental health in adolescence.

The 10-Year Health Plan, Child Poverty Strategy, and Best Start in Life Strategy all set out the action we are taking to raise the healthiest generation of children ever and reduce long-term health inequalities. This includes our supervised toothbrushing programme for three-to-five-year-olds in deprived areas, increasing the weekly value of Healthy Start by 10%, and over £500 million to roll out Best Start Family Hubs to every local authority.

We are committed to strengthening the evidence on children’s health and its lifelong impacts. We have commissioned research through the National Institute for Health and Care Research to deepen our understanding of early-years risk factors and inequalities, which is due to report in 2027/28.

General practices (GPs) serving more deprived areas receive on average 9.8% less funding per needs adjusted patient than those in less deprived communities, despite having greater health needs and significantly higher patient-to-GP ratios.

We recognise the importance of ensuring funding for core services is distributed equitably between practices across the country. This is why we are currently reviewing the way GP funding is allocated across England, via the Carr-Hill formula. The review will look at how health needs are reflected in the distribution of funding through the GP Contract.

To further improve access and capacity, we have invested £1.1 billion in GPs, and £160 million of this has been to expand the GP workforce, by recruiting 2,000 more GPs since October 2024.

Boosting the supply of homes of all tenures must be at the heart of any strategy to improve housing affordability which is why the government’s Plan for Change includes a hugely ambitious milestone of building 1.5 million safe and decent homes in England in this Parliament.

The Renters’ Rights Bill empowers private rented sector tenants to challenge unreasonable rent increases, with all rent increases taking place via an existing statutory process. Tenants who receive a rent increase that they feel is not representative of the market value will be able to challenge the increase at the First-tier Tribunal.

The Bill also takes practical steps to end the practices of rental bidding and landlords demanding large amounts of rent in advance. These unfair practices pit tenants against one another, encouraging them to either stretch their finances to the limit or prevent them from accessing the private rented sector altogether.