Has child poverty fallen by 100,000 since 2010?

9 June 2024

On Sky News’ Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips, work and pensions secretary Mel Stride claimed “we have reduced child poverty in this country by 100,000” since 2010.

Mr Stride’s claim is true according to one measure of child poverty—“absolute” low income after housing costs. The latest data shows the number of children on this measure fell from 3.7 million in 2009/10 to 3.6 million in 2022/23. 

But other measures show a rise in child poverty since 2010.

For example, the equivalent figure for absolute low income before housing costs shows an increase since 2009/10, from 2.5 million to 2.6 million. 

The number of children in “relative” poverty after housing costs has increased since 2009/10, from 3.9 million to 4.3 million. And it’s also increased before housing costs, from 2.6 million to 3.2 million in 2022/23.

We wrote more about these figures and the different ways to measure child poverty last month.

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