Towards a prosperous, poverty-free Wales

Poverty Some money on a table
This image is from the Bevan Foundation's media library
ViewsMarch 21st, 2016

Bold plans to reduce poverty in Wales by 100,000 by 2021 are reviewed by Victoria Winckler.

Poverty seems to be one of those intractable problems that we are learning to live with. The number of people living on incomes below the poverty threshold has hardly changed in a decade, despite the high profile that the issue has had in this time.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation is arguing that not only is this a waste of talent, lives and money, the next Welsh Government could actually achieve a real reduction in the numbers on low incomes over its next term – 100,000 fewer people in fact.

This isn’t wishful thinking but a meaningful, achievable target that could transform people’s lives and prospects.

How?

The way forward draws on the findings of the JRF’s major anti-poverty strategy, due for publication later in 2016. The briefing, published today, argues for a change in approach, a shift that is arguably as important as a change in action.

A future anti-poverty strategy for Wales must involve all sectors.

It must include all parts of the public sector – with the central role of local authorities being recognised and supported as well as the role of the NHS, schools and colleges. It must include the third sector, in its many and various forms. And, perhaps most importantly of all, it must include the private sector, for it is Wales’ businesses which offer a route into work for the majority of those who are unemployed and which provide essential services (whether housing, food or short-term loans) to those on low incomes.

A future anti-poverty strategy for Wales must be multi-dimensional.

JRF recommend that reducing poverty will need action in all areas including the jobs market, housing, early years and child care, education, social security benefits and the costs of essential goods and services.  The solutions are much broader than ‘work is the route out of poverty’, and so the past focus on ’employability’ needs to be broadened.

A future anti-poverty strategy needs to recognise diversity

People on low incomes are as varied as the population as a whole – they range from new born babies to teenagers to lone parents to disabled people to people of mixed race to people aged 85 plus. They live in rural areas, villages, the valleys and our cities. So, a one-size-fits-all strategy – especially one focused on work – simply will not fit very many of those on low incomes. There needs to be action for all age groups, all places and all abilities.

A future anti-poverty strategy should focus on ‘what works’

What is proven to work is this:

  • high quality childcare and early years education
  • better teaching in schools to close the educational attainment gap
  • helping young people to move into work
  • improving the quality and quantity of jobs available
  • improving support for older people with health care needs
  • improving benefit take up amongst older people.

It is true that the Welsh Government does not control the major levers over household incomes – the tax and benefit system or the state of the economy. But it does control many of the services which shape where people sit in the income distribution, and as such it can – and should – make a big difference.

Victoria Winckler is Director of the Bevan Foundation.

You might also like our costed programme for reducing poverty by an even more ambitious 50,000 a year – available here

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