Family poverty falls faster in Wales, but one in four children still affected

Monitoring poverty and social exclusion in Wales 2005 shows that roughly a third of the 170,000 children in homes below the poverty threshold live in the Valleys, a third in Cardiff and the rest of the South, and a third in North, West and Mid-Wales. More than half live with lone parents who are mostly not working.

The report, which examines 32 different indicators, including education, employment, health and housing as well as poverty indicators, is being launched today at the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff, at an event where Rhodri Morgan, First Minister in the Welsh Assembly Government, will be the keynote speaker.

Compiled for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation by researchers from the New Policy Institute, the report shows that 640,000 people in Wales were living in poverty on the latest official figures including 120,000 pensioners and 350,000 working-age adults. Its main findings also show that:

• Unemployment has almost halved in a decade to around 60,000. However, a further 95,000 people are classified as 'economically inactive, but wanting work' due to sickness, disability or lone parenthood. The highest combined levels of people who lack work are in the Valleys where more than one in eight adults of working age is affected.
• Low pay, especially among women, is an increasingly significant cause of poverty in Wales. More than a third of poor households include an adult who is working. Despite the minimum wage and tax credits, the numbers experiencing 'in-work poverty' are no lower than in the mid-1990s.
• One in four women in full-time jobs and 60 per cent of those in part-time work are paid less than £6.50 an hour. Low pay is most prevalent in rural Pembrokeshire, Gwynedd and Powys.
• Former mining areas in the South have the highest proportions anywhere in Wales or England of adults who are out of work because of limiting long-term illness. Carmarthenshire, Ceredigion, Gwynedd and Ynys Mon also have many localities where levels are above-average.
• Although the conventional measure of poverty (households with less than 60 per of UK median income) has improved over ten years, the numbers in Wales who live in 'deep poverty' (40 per cent of median household income) has remained the same at around 250,000.

Among education trends, the report finds that:

• Although attainment in schools has improved in the past decade, the job prospects for those who achieve the fewest qualifications remain poor – placing them at high risk of future poverty.
• The proportion of 16-year-olds who fail to achieve five GCSE passes has remained unchanged since 2000 at 15 per cent. The 7.5 per cent who get no GCSE passes at all is worse than in any English region.
• Among secondary schools with low proportions of pupils entitled to free school meals, just 6 per cent fail to achieve five or more GCSEs. This compares with 27 per cent in schools where a high proportion of students come from low-income families.

On older people in Wales, the report shows that:

• The proportion of pensioners in low-income households has declined since the mid-1990s from 25 to 20 per cent. Most of this fall has been among single pensioners who are now no more likely to be living in poverty than couples.
• A third of older people live alone, with women outnumbering men by three to one. Although more money and staff time is being devoted to the care needs of frail, older people, the proportion who receive home care from their local authority has almost halved over ten years.
• Older people are especially affected by disparities in the number of family doctors. In Flintshire and Rhondda-Cynon-Taff there are 2,000 patients per GP compared with 1,200 in Powys and Ceredigion.

Housing indicators show that:

• Homelessness has risen sharply. The number of households accepted by Welsh local authorities as homeless has doubled from 8,000 in 2000 to 16,000 in 2004. Two-thirds of homeless households are people without children. Use of temporary accommodation has trebled.

Transport indicators show that:

• A majority of households throughout Wales say that local bus services do not meet their needs for weekday travel. Two out of five who lack a car say the bus service is inadequate to reach shops, while two thirds say it is unhelpful for reaching local hospitals. Groups most likely to lack a car are lone parent households (half) and single pensioners (two-thirds).

Dr Peter Kenway, joint Director of the New Policy Institute and co-author of the report, said: “We have been routinely monitoring poverty and social exclusion across Britain since 1998, but this is the first annual report we have produced specific to Wales. The 32 indicators have been chosen to reflect particular Welsh concerns and we hope the results will provide a valuable planning tool for local and national policy makers, as well as voluntary organisations and others concerned with tackling poverty."

He added: "Although poverty and disadvantage are at their deepest in the Valleys, our report shows that people in all parts of Wales face these problems. Politicians in Cardiff and London need to respond accordingly."