§ Miss McIntoshTo ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if he will make a statement on the level of persistent poverty. [169971]
§ Mr. PondIndicators of persistent low income for children, working age adults and older people are included in the fifth annual Opportunity for all report (Cm 5956), which is available in the Library.
We are determined to tackle poverty, from childhood through to old age. The nature of measuring persistent low income means that it will take longer for the impact of tax credits, increases in employment and pension credit for example to be reflected in the data. The progress we have made, for instance, in reducing the number of children with low incomes in a given year have yet to show up in these figures. However, there are now over half a million fewer children in low-income households (below 60 per cent. median income) than in 1997.