§ Mr. Paul MarsdenTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many and what percentage of children were living in poverty in each constituency in the last year for which figures are available. [83189]
§ Dawn PrimaroloPoverty is a complex multi-dimensional issue, affecting many aspects of children's lives—including income, health, housing, the quality of their environment and opportunities to learn. There is therefore no single measure of the number of families with children in poverty in each constituency of the UK.
The Government have a PSA target to reduce by a quarter the number of children living in households below 60 per cent, of median income by 2004, compared with 1998–99.
In "Opportunity for All", the Government's annual anti-poverty report, the Government report progress in tackling poverty and social exclusion against this and a range of other indicators. The annual "Households Below Average Income" report, published by the Department for Work and Pensions and the Office for National Statistics, gives a breakdown of the percentage of children below the 60 per cent, median income threshold in each region of Great Britain. But no such information is available on a constituency-by-constituency basis.