Child Poverty Strategy

Chris Bloore Excerpts

Monday 8th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Chris Bloore (Redditch) (Lab)]

Before I came to this place, I assumed it was a shared fundamental principle that all hon. Members wanted to ensure that today’s children had more than they had. The Conservatives do not want to talk about the 900,000 children they plunged into poverty. I commend the Secretary of State for her strategy that champions the life chances of children in Redditch, rather doing what the Conservatives did: using them as cheap, dehumanising political slogans for their own ends.

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend is right that too often children have been used as pawns in a political game, using political dividing lines, where the evidence simply does not back up what the Conservative party says. Children in poverty and their families do not lack ambition or aspiration. Those families want the best for their children and they want better life changes than they enjoyed themselves. This Labour Government will ensure that children in Redditch, and across our country, get those opportunities.

Giving Every Child the Best Start in Life

Chris Bloore Excerpts

Monday 7th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend’s local authority will now benefit from this extra funding, and it will make a tremendous difference to children and families across his community. Like my hon. Friend, I have heard that story from so many school leaders, teachers and support staff who go above and beyond to support families who are often facing very real challenges and difficulties around homelessness, poverty. We want to make their job easier. That is why we are expanding free school meals eligibility, putting in place new free breakfast clubs, cutting the cost of school uniforms and increasing the national minimum wage. Those are all measures designed to support families, and they will bring big educational benefits too.

[Chris Bloore (Redditch) (Lab)]

Twelve months ago the Prime Minister gave his final speech of the election campaign in Redditch in a Sure Start centre abandoned by the last Government, in an economically deprived area of my town that was forgotten by the last Government, and in a county that did not receive a single penny of funding for any family hubs in 14 years. Despite the chuntering from the Conservatives, does the Secretary of State agree that it is actions not words that lead to the best futures for our children?

[Bridget Phillipson]

I agree with my hon. Friend. It is this Labour Government who will once again ensure that all our children are set up to succeed. We will build on the proud legacy of Sure Start, take the best evidence of what works, and expand and enhance that for the generations of children to come, in his community and across the country.