Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Buscombe on 19 December (HL12320), what assessment have they made of the main conclusions of the report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation UK Poverty 2018, published on 4 December 2018, that (1) child poverty has been rising since 2011–12, (2) 4.1 million children are living in poverty, a rise of 500,000 in the last five years, (3) four million workers are living in poverty, a rise of more than half a million over five years, and (4) that in-work poverty has been rising faster than employment.

(1) & (2) We disagree with the reports emphasis and analysis being solely based on a relative poverty measure. There are 300,000 fewer children (both before and after housing costs) living in absolute poverty since 2010.

(3) & (4) The risk of being in absolute poverty (before housing costs), if you are in work, has remained broadly stable over time. Also, there is an 8 per cent chance of working-age adults being in absolute poverty (before housing costs), which is the lowest since 2005. For children in couple families, there is only a 2 per cent chance of being in absolute poverty (before housing costs) if both parents work full-time. Also, the majority of those in-work poverty are those with part-time work only, single earner couples, or those in full-time self-employment. Finally, Universal Credit helps by incentivising the entry into work, offering smooth incentives to increase hours, and setting a general expectation that lone parents and partners should work (if not caring for young children or a disabled person) and offers generous childcare subsidies.