Major new poverty survey finds two million children without ‘necessities of life’.

This new evidence concerning deprivation among adults and children emerges from the results of a major national survey of poverty and social exclusion supported by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Carried out by the Office for National Statistics and analysed by researchers from four universities, the survey is the most comprehensive and rigorous of its type ever conducted.

Interviews with a nationally-representative sample of adults were used to draw up a checklist of household items and activities that a majority of people consider to be necessities that everyone should be ‘able to afford and which they should not have to do without’. A second survey was then conducted to discover how many individuals lacked these ‘necessities of life’ and gather other information on income and social exclusion. The study found that:

• Around 9.5 million people cannot afford to keep their homes adequately heated, free from damp or in a decent states of decoration - the housing conditions that most people regard as ‘adequate’.
• Some 8 million people cannot afford one or more essential household goods such as a fridge, a telephone or carpets for the living areas in their homes.
• Around 4 million people are not fed properly by today’s standards. For example, they do not have enough money to afford fresh fruit and vegetables, or two meals a day.
• Some 6.5 million adults go without essential clothing - such as a warm, waterproof coat - because of lack of money.
• About 10 million adults cannot afford regular savings of £10 a month or more ‘for a rainy day or retirement’.
• Almost 7.5 million people are too poor to engage in social activities considered necessary like visiting friends and family, attending weddings and funerals or having celebrations on special occasions.

Looking at children’s lives in the light of a list of items that parents had identified as necessities, the study also found that:

• More than two million children (18 per cent) are going without two or more necessities. About 4 million (34 per cent) are without at least one essential item, such as adequate clothing, a healthy diet, items to help their educational development, an annual week’s holiday away from home, or social activities.
• Although almost every parent interviewed agreed that new, properly-fitted shoes, a warm, waterproof coat and daily fresh fruit and vegetables were essential for children, the survey showed that one in 50 children went without them.
• Poverty rates among children were highest in homes: where no adult had any work at all or worked only part-time; in lone-parent households; in large families; in households where someone was chronically sick or disabled and in families of non-white ethnic origin.

Sue Middleton, part of a team at Loughborough University that analysed the survey data on children, said: “This evidence is vitally important at a time when government is seeking to abolish childhood poverty within a generation. Some British children are going without items which are widely accepted as being vital to the health and development of children.”

The researchers found that 26 per cent of the population lacked two or more items and had low incomes. This definition of poverty applied to 71 per cent of unemployed people and 61 per cent of long-term sick and disabled people who lived in households where no one was in paid work. The rate for lone parents with one child was 62 per cent.

Dr David Gordon of the University of Bristol, co-author of the report, said: “Lack of paid work is an important factor in causing poverty. But even if full employment is achieved, social exclusion will not disappear. Low-earning families will still need adequate child benefits and pensioners, disabled people and others unable to work will still need minimally adequate support from the state to meet their needs. High quality, affordable services will also be needed if the Government’s goals for eliminating poverty and social exclusion are to achieved.”

Poverty over time

The survey methods allowed the researchers to compare their findings with results from two earlier ‘Breadline Britain’ surveys that used similar methods: taking account of low income and multiple deprivation of socially-defined ‘necessities’. This showed that between 1983 and 1990 the number of households living in poverty grew from 14 per cent to 21 per cent. The equivalent proportion in 1999 was higher still at more than 24 per cent. However, the number of households defined as living in chronic, long-term poverty fell from 4 per cent to 2.5 per cent.

Professor Jonathan Bradshaw of the University of York, co-author of the report, said: “Britain now stands at a crossroads in terms of adopting effective measures to stop and reverse the damaging structural trends that have increased poverty and social exclusion in the past 20 years. High rates of social deprivation have the effects of worsening health, education, and job skills, as well as relationships within families, between ethnic groups and across society as a whole. If Britain is to become an inclusive society in which everybody has a stake and is able to participate then the most important task facing government is the ending of poverty and social exclusion.”