Local Child Poverty Statistics 2024
Local child poverty rates, After Housing Costs
Every year the End Child Poverty Coalition, together with the Centre for Research in Social Policy at Loughborough University, publishes data on the number of children living in poverty, in each Westminster Constituency and Local Authority across the UK.
This year (June 2024) we have calculated child poverty rates for the old Parliamentary Constiucny, and the Constituencies that will be used in the 2024 General Election.
Quick Links
- to find out the level of child poverty in your constituency and local authority
- from Loughborough University
- Have questions? Read our FAQs
- Looking for press releases? See our Media Resources page
In the report and briefing document we compare child poverty percentages to the percentages of children impacted by the two-child limit. This uses data from 2023 from the Department for Work and Pensions, HMRC and Department of Communities in Northern Ireland obtained under FOI, which provided figures for the old pre-2024 electoral boundaries. This data was modelled to the new election boundaries.
Summary and Recommendations from this Year’s Statistics
- 4.3 million children were in relative poverty, after housing costs – representing 30% of all children in 2022/23,
- 2/3 of parliamentary constituencies have a child poverty rate of 25% or more,
- Rates of child poverty at or above 25% are particularly prevalent in the North East, North West West Midlands and Wales. In the North West, the worst impacted region, 90% of all parliamentary constituencies have a child poverty rate of 25% or more
- There is a strong positive correlation between child poverty and the two-child limit to benefit payments
- The is widespread inequality in the rate of child poverty within the countries and regions of the UK, and this has widened over time.
These findings show that the government must:
- Create a comprehensive roadmap for ending child poverty by focusing on the systemic causes of child poverty, via cross-departmental action and at all levels of government. This must include the monitoring of child poverty levels and setting targets for reduction.
- Immediately scrap the two-child limit to benefit payments, which would lift 300,000 children out of poverty.
By Layla, aged 19 from London (name changed to protect her identity)
“The recent findings from Loughborough University for the End Child Poverty Coalition resonate deeply with me, and seeing that over 30% of children across the UK are living in poverty, with two-thirds of new constituencies having at least a quarter of children facing this struggle, brings back vivid memories of my own childhood and the beginning of my own adulthood”
“Growing up in poverty meant constant uncertainty and anxiety, and meant watching my caregiver struggle to make ends meet, sometimes having to choose between paying bills or buying food. It meant missing out on school trips, new clothes, and being pointed out as the free school meals kid. what I’m trying to say is that these are not just statistics; they represent real lives, real struggles, and real futures at risk.”
Child poverty and the two-child limit
The two-child limit is a policy that restricts eligibility for means-tested benefits to the first two children in a family, for children born after April 2017. The policy has been widely criticised as a driver of child poverty, causing extreme hardship for many larger families. Removing the policy would lift 300,000 children out of poverty, while reducing the depth of poverty for a further 800,000 children, at a cost of just £1.8 billion.
The graph below demonstrates the strength of the relationship between the two-child limit and child poverty, at constituency level. The chart looks at the correlation between the 2022/23 child poverty rate and the proportion of children affected by the two-child limit in each of the new constituency areas. The data on the two-child limit have been adjusted to reflect the new constituency boundaries that will come into effect after the general election, thereby allowing them to be matched to the corresponding child poverty estimates. The two are extremely highly correlated, and while it is not possible to directly evaluate the causal effect of the two-child limit on poverty, this is clearly implied by the strength of the association.
A note on how the data should be interpreted
The statistics on local child poverty rates after housing costs presented in today’s report are calibrated to the Department for Work and Pensions’ (DWP) Households Below Average Income (HBAI) dataset for FYE 2022 and FYE 2023. The DWP’s data have undergone quality assurance, by this department, prior to publication. However, some issues remain; this is partly due to sampling issues related to the Covid-19 pandemic. We advise that users are encouraged to exercise caution when interpreting the data. We further recommend that users of these Local Child Poverty Statistics focus on longer-term trends to understand how poverty has changed in an area rather than year-on-year changes which are prone to fluctuations, and avoid direct comparisons of the overall rates of child poverty between nations and regions.
