Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Afzal Khan and Bridget Phillipson

Wednesday 11th March 2026 Commons Chamber

[Afzal Khan (Manchester Rusholme) (Lab)]

2. What steps she is taking with Cabinet colleagues to help reduce inequalities experienced by children in poverty.

[The Minister for Women and Equalities (Bridget Phillipson)]

Tackling child poverty is the moral mission of this Labour Government. Background should not determine what we can go on to achieve in life, but inequality and poverty are barriers to opportunity. We are investing in our children’s futures through a massive expansion of Best Start family hubs, childcare, breakfast clubs and free school meals, alongside the end to the two-child limit, and our child poverty strategy will deliver the biggest ever reduction in child poverty in a single Parliament.

[Afzal Khan]

In families with disabled children, 25% of those children are living in deep material poverty. The recent uprating of universal credit will be a great help for children growing up in such households, but equipment costs and other expenses, such as specialist childcare, remain significant pressures. Will the Minister set out what more she is doing to address the inequalities felt by children growing up in households with at least one disabled child?

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend is right. We recognise the disproportionate financial strain on families with disabled children, who often face significantly higher costs for essentials. We heard that during the development of the child poverty strategy, through many of the children’s rights groups and other organisations that contributed to that work. Our child poverty strategy sets out a plan to lift over half a million children out of poverty by the end of this Parliament. Alongside that, we are taking specific steps to support children with additional needs, providing £200 million of investment to ensure that every Best Start family hub has a dedicated practitioner for children with special educational needs and disabilities.

Child Poverty Strategy

Debate between Afzal Khan and Bridget Phillipson

Monday 8th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

I would be happy to meet my hon. Friend. I know he has done an incredible amount to champion the life chances of children in his community, which covers many towns and villages and a big rural population. That presents some unique challenges, and perhaps we could discuss that further and how we can ensure that more of his constituents benefit from family support services. The lifting of the two-child limit will make a huge difference, alongside the wider measures on childcare.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester Rusholme) (Lab)]

Following 14 years of Tory austerity, harsh cuts to public services and a cost of living crisis, more than half of all children in my Manchester Rusholme constituency are living in poverty. My right hon. Friend has shown excellent leadership through this strategy, but given the dire condition in which the Tories left the country, may I encourage her to look at measures to prevent the causes of poverty and to go further, so that we can end child poverty for good?

[Bridget Phillipson]

Yes. Like my hon. Friend, I am always ambitious to do more to lift more children out of poverty and to create better conditions to tackle the root causes of poverty. This ambitious strategy is an incredibly strong start that will see the biggest reduction in child poverty numbers in any Parliament since records began. That shows the scale of our ambition, and this 10-year strategy will ensure that fewer children suffer the injustice and the deep moral scar of growing up in poverty, but there is, of course, always more to do.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Afzal Khan and Bridget Phillipson

Monday 4th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

I agree that it is important we get the balance right. That is why the Deputy Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Business and Trade are looking carefully, as part of our wider reforms to employment support and employment law, at what more we need to do around parental leave entitlements. I share the hon. Member’s concern about the comments we have heard from the now leader of the Conservative party, the right hon. Member for North West Essex (Mrs Badenoch), about maternity pay. I want to make sure that parents have choices about what works for them, what is best for them and what best supports their children’s development in those crucial early years.

[Afzal Khan (Manchester Rusholme) (Lab)]

2. What steps she is taking to provide preventive education for schoolchildren about knife crime.