Debate contribution: Child Poverty

Debate contribution by Mr Robbie Butler on 14 October 2025.

MLA

Mr Robbie Butler

Party at the time

Ulster Unionist Party

Date

14 October 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Child Poverty

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5180720

Read the official Assembly record

Text

The Assembly needs no reminder that child poverty in Northern Ireland needs to be tackled. We have had many debates on the issue. The 'Northern Ireland Poverty and Income Inequality Report, 2023/24' showed that one in five of our children are living in absolute poverty and one in four are living in relative poverty. Behind those numbers are children growing up in homes that are sometimes cold, parents skipping meals so that their children can eat and young people who see no realistic way to get ahead. That is the daily reality in too many households. When we look at some of the things that the Executive have tackled, poverty sits at their root cause. Take educational underachievement: we know that it is correlated with poverty. Take health inequalities: there is an inevitable correlation with poverty. Therefore, it is a cross-Executive matter. However, under the New Decade, New Approach agreement, the Executive promised an anti-poverty strategy and a child poverty strategy. It was accepted at that stage that one document could serve both purposes but only if it had a clear, measurable focus on children and measurable outcomes for children. The current draft, sadly, does not. The Children's Commissioner, for instance, has said plainly that it is "not fit for purpose", and many others share that view. It has been said by some in the sector that there are no new policies, no timelines and no ring-fenced budget. That part is unarguable. The Northern Ireland Audit Office called for a cross-departmental plan with clear, measurable targets, and the Public Accounts Committee warned that, without those targets, no strategy can deliver real change, yet no such targets appear in the draft. To the Minister's credit, the new disability and work strategy committed to supporting 50,000 disabled people into work by 2036, which is a welcome and specific target.

Absolutely, yes.

Thank you. Given the history of the Executive, setting aside the Ministers who have those portfolios at the moment, the difficulty is that we set strategies and then fail to deliver on them. If we fail to put it on paper, we will never hit the targets. The Minister is right to say —

Yes.

Yes. Thank you. I will not give way any more, because I want to get through this. I agree with the Member for East Belfast. That is the point that I am getting to. The Minister has already shown that the Department has the capacity to be specific. It goes back to the point that I made that, in bringing forward one document that was agreed in 'New Decade, New Approach', the fear was that certain specifics would be missed. Childhood poverty is one such specific that, we feel, is missing. The NI Anti-Poverty Network, which is supported by more than 80 organisations, has called for the document to be rewritten. That is not a political move; it is the powerful testimony of 80 separate organisations that serve those people daily, whether it is at food banks or through the provision of advice and help. They said that it focuses on personal behaviour rather than on the structural causes of poverty and, in doing so, stigmatises the very people whom it should help. We also have the voices of those living in poverty. During the consultation, the Women's Support Network, Save the Children NI, the NI Anti-Poverty Network and Dr Ciara Fitzpatrick engaged directly with 145 people living in poverty. The results speak for themselves: 78% said that the draft strategy would make no difference to their life; 15% said that they were unsure whether it would make a difference; and only 7% believed that it would help. Eighty-two per cent stated that it was poor. People were clear about what would make a real difference: providing free school meals for all pupils; reinstating the holiday hunger scheme; capping school uniform costs; and increasing grants. Those are all very hard to deliver, but they are certainly worthy of debate. I welcome the fact that the School Uniforms (Guidelines and Allowances) Bill passed its Final Stage yesterday. I look forward to it doing what the Education Minister outlined: genuinely reducing the cost of uniforms for families. Those people also called for raising the level of social security benefits to reflect the true cost of living; removing the two-child limit and the five-week universal credit wait; introducing a Northern Ireland child payment; and ensuring affordable childcare and housing. Those are not radical asks; they are practical measures and have worked elsewhere. I also have to point out and recognise that poverty is not confined to our cities. In rural communities, families face higher living costs, poorer public transport, limited childcare and older, less efficient housing. Many spend more to heat their homes and to travel to work or school. Any credible anti-poverty strategy must reflect those realities and ensure that rural households are not left behind. We must also be honest about welfare reform. The draft strategy mentions the existing mitigations for the bedroom tax and the benefit cap, but it commits to nothing beyond continuing them. I hope that that is the subject of high-level discussion in the Executive. The Cliff Edge Coalition has been clear: strengthen the mitigations; end the five-week wait; remove the two-child limit; and support private renters who have been hit by the frozen local housing allowance. Poverty does not happen by accident. It is shaped by political policy decisions. If those are made on the basis of the right choices, we can move the dial on poverty in Northern Ireland. A real anti-poverty strategy must be measurable, time bound, targeted and properly funded. In that regard, Minister, you will have the willing ear of the Ulster Unionist Party in the Executive, because as my party leader, Mike Nesbitt, has pointed out many times, if we want to shift left in Health, we need to tackle the inequalities that are rooted in poverty, and we will improve people's outcomes as best we can.

1,000 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 13:36 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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