Fight against poverty must stay in spotlight

Watching children in damp, dirty, overcrowded housing without enough money for food, it is difficult to believe that this is an issue that is seriously in danger of falling off the political agenda. But this month, the NUT and Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) joined forces to highlight just this threat.

At a packed fringe event at this month's Compass conference, teachers and activists from up and down the country spoke compellingly about the consequences of child poverty in their communities.

The government's child poverty strategy caused concern when it was launched earlier this year, both in its approach and because it is hard to see how it can deliver. It is based on the misguided belief that worklessness is the key issue. In reality, much effort was put into tackling entrenched generational worklessness over the previous decade and child poverty for those out of work declined. The key issue now facing families across the country, including in my own Wigan constituency, is how to make work pay. This wrong-headed basis for the strategy leads ministers to the staggering conclusion that the way to tackle child poverty is to cut benefits – to families like those featured in Poor Kids who are already struggling to buy food, shoes and medicines – in order to push people into work.