Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps her Department is taking to help reduce poverty for people on the lowest incomes.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are committed to tackling poverty and supporting people into good work will be the foundation of our approach. Our plan to Make Work Pay will tackle poor working conditions, poor job security and low pay.
To take crucial steps towards the creation of a genuine living wage that supports families the Government increased the National Living Wage and National Minimum Wage rates on 1 April 2025, delivering a pay rise to over three million workers.
Our Get Britain Working White Paper, backed by £240 million investment, will target and tackle economic inactivity and unemployment and join up employment, health and skills support to meet the needs of local communities.
Alongside this, we are committed to reviewing Universal Credit to make sure it is doing the job we want it to do, to make work pay and tackle poverty. We have begun this work with the announcement of the Fair Repayment Rate in April, giving 1.2 million of the poorest households an average of £420 per year. Furthermore, in the Pathways to Work Green Paper, we announced that we will improve the adequacy of the standard allowance with the first sustained above inflation rise in the basic rate of Universal Credit since it was introduced.
To further support struggling households, funding of £742 million has been provided to enable the extension of the Household Support Fund from 1 April 2025 to 31 March 2026 in England, plus additional funding for the Devolved Governments through the Barnett formula to be spent at their discretion.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment her Department has made of trends in the level of poverty among people in receipt of social security; and if she will introduce a statutory poverty reduction target.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Statistics on the number of people living in absolute and relative poverty in the UK are published annually in the “Households Below Average Income” publication at Households below average income: for financial years ending 1995 to 2024 - GOV.UK. Tables giving the percentage of individuals in relative poverty by state support received by the family are published in “table 5.9db” of “workingage-hbai-detalied-breakdown-2023-24-tables”, “table 6.6db” of “pensioners-hbai-detailed-breakdown-2023-24-tables”, and “table 4.6db” of “children-hbai-detailed-breakdown-2023-24-tables”. The latest statistics published on 27 March 2025 are for the financial period 2023/24.
The latest available data can also be found on Stat-Xplore: https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/. Guidance on how to use it can be found here: https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/webapi/online-help/User-Guide.html.
The Child Poverty Taskforce is continuing its urgent work and is exploring all available levers to drive forward short and long-term actions across government to reduce child poverty.
Our metrics must also reflect the experience of poverty in households across the UK and the urgent need to focus on those children experiencing the most severe and acute forms of poverty. The Taskforce will consider how best to measure this as the strategy develops, including through our work on the material deprivation measure following the recent review of the material deprivation survey questions carried out by the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to page 72 of the National Disability Strategy, published in July 2021, what progress his Department has made on establishing the Extra Costs Taskforce.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
We are pleased that we can restart the work around the Extra Costs Taskforce. The Taskforce will be focused on bringing together disabled people, regulators and businesses, to better understand the extra costs faced by disabled people, including how this breaks down for different impairments.
The Disability Unit is currently working up a project plan and engaging with other government departments to take this commitment forward. The Disability Unit has begun to engage with interested stakeholders, including the Disability Charities Consortium, to develop an understanding around the definition of extra costs and what the terms of reference and focus areas of the Taskforce could be.
The Disability Unit will also be using insight from the Disability Action Plan consultation findings regarding the impact of the cost of living on disabled people when taking forward work on the Extra Costs Taskforce.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate he has made of how many families have received funding from the Household Support Fund in (a) Manchester, Gorton constituency and (b) Greater Manchester since October 2021.
Answered by Jo Churchill
There have been four Household Support Fund (HSF) schemes to date, with the current iteration running until the end of March 2024. Management Information (MI) was published for HSF1-3 following the completion of each scheme and can be found here.
Household Support Fund management information: 6 October 2021 to 31 March 2022 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
The latest MI covering HSF3 was published in August 2023. We will similarly look to publish MI for the entirety of HSF4 following scheme completion and subject to quality assurance processes. An evaluation of the current HSF4 scheme is underway. This will seek to understand the delivery and impacts of scheme funding.
The number of awards is reported by Authorities, and so data at a constituency level is not available. A total of 1.8m HSF awards were provided to residents in the Local Authorities that make up Greater Manchester (Manchester, Stockport, Tameside, Oldham, Rochdale, Bury, Bolton, Wigan, Salford and Trafford) during HSF1-3,including 420,000 in Manchester City Council. The number of awards, as reported by Authorities, may not represent the number of people helped as some may have received multiple awards.
No assessment has been made of the impact of the Household Support Fund on child poverty. The HSF is an intentionally flexible scheme designed to enable Local Authorities to respond to local need. Local Authorities are encouraged through our scheme guidance to consider the needs of households including families with children of all ages.
A total of £80.7m has been spent in the Local Authorities that make up Greater Manchester during HSF1-3 of which an average 69% has been spent on families with children. This includes 19.4m spent in the Manchester Local Authority of which 52% has been spent on families with children. Overall, Greater Manchester has been allocated £134.6m over all 4 rounds of the Household Support Fund including £32.3m for the Manchester Local Authority. Information regarding HSF4 funding allocations can be found here.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the Household Support Fund on levels of child poverty in Manchester, Gorton constituency since October 2021.
Answered by Jo Churchill
There have been four Household Support Fund (HSF) schemes to date, with the current iteration running until the end of March 2024. Management Information (MI) was published for HSF1-3 following the completion of each scheme and can be found here.
Household Support Fund management information: 6 October 2021 to 31 March 2022 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
The latest MI covering HSF3 was published in August 2023. We will similarly look to publish MI for the entirety of HSF4 following scheme completion and subject to quality assurance processes. An evaluation of the current HSF4 scheme is underway. This will seek to understand the delivery and impacts of scheme funding.
The number of awards is reported by Authorities, and so data at a constituency level is not available. A total of 1.8m HSF awards were provided to residents in the Local Authorities that make up Greater Manchester (Manchester, Stockport, Tameside, Oldham, Rochdale, Bury, Bolton, Wigan, Salford and Trafford) during HSF1-3,including 420,000 in Manchester City Council. The number of awards, as reported by Authorities, may not represent the number of people helped as some may have received multiple awards.
No assessment has been made of the impact of the Household Support Fund on child poverty. The HSF is an intentionally flexible scheme designed to enable Local Authorities to respond to local need. Local Authorities are encouraged through our scheme guidance to consider the needs of households including families with children of all ages.
A total of £80.7m has been spent in the Local Authorities that make up Greater Manchester during HSF1-3 of which an average 69% has been spent on families with children. This includes 19.4m spent in the Manchester Local Authority of which 52% has been spent on families with children. Overall, Greater Manchester has been allocated £134.6m over all 4 rounds of the Household Support Fund including £32.3m for the Manchester Local Authority. Information regarding HSF4 funding allocations can be found here.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many awards have been made through the Household Support Fund in (a) Manchester, Gorton constituency and (b) Greater Manchester since October 2021.
Answered by Jo Churchill
There have been four Household Support Fund (HSF) schemes to date, with the current iteration running until the end of March 2024. Management Information (MI) was published for HSF1-3 following the completion of each scheme and can be found here.
Household Support Fund management information: 6 October 2021 to 31 March 2022 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
The latest MI covering HSF3 was published in August 2023. We will similarly look to publish MI for the entirety of HSF4 following scheme completion and subject to quality assurance processes. An evaluation of the current HSF4 scheme is underway. This will seek to understand the delivery and impacts of scheme funding.
The number of awards is reported by Authorities, and so data at a constituency level is not available. A total of 1.8m HSF awards were provided to residents in the Local Authorities that make up Greater Manchester (Manchester, Stockport, Tameside, Oldham, Rochdale, Bury, Bolton, Wigan, Salford and Trafford) during HSF1-3,including 420,000 in Manchester City Council. The number of awards, as reported by Authorities, may not represent the number of people helped as some may have received multiple awards.
No assessment has been made of the impact of the Household Support Fund on child poverty. The HSF is an intentionally flexible scheme designed to enable Local Authorities to respond to local need. Local Authorities are encouraged through our scheme guidance to consider the needs of households including families with children of all ages.
A total of £80.7m has been spent in the Local Authorities that make up Greater Manchester during HSF1-3 of which an average 69% has been spent on families with children. This includes 19.4m spent in the Manchester Local Authority of which 52% has been spent on families with children. Overall, Greater Manchester has been allocated £134.6m over all 4 rounds of the Household Support Fund including £32.3m for the Manchester Local Authority. Information regarding HSF4 funding allocations can be found here.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to reduce child poverty in Manchester, Gorton constituency.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
The Government is committed to reducing poverty, including child poverty, and supporting low-income families. We will spend around £276bn through the welfare system in Great Britain in 2023/24 including around £124bn on people of working age and children.
From April 2023, we uprated benefit rates and State Pensions by 10.1% and, subject to Parliamentary approval, working-age benefits will rise by 6.7% from April 2024, in line with inflation.
In 2021/22 there were 1.7 million fewer people in absolute poverty after housing costs than in 2009/10, including 400,000 fewer children.
With almost one million job vacancies across the UK, our focus remains firmly on supporting people, including parents, to move into and progress in work. This approach which is based on clear evidence about the importance of employment - particularly where it is full-time - in substantially reducing the risks of poverty. The latest statistics show that in 2021/22 children living in workless households were 5 times more likely to be in absolute poverty, after housing costs, than those where all adults work.
To help people into work, our core Jobcentre offer provides a range of options, including face-to-face time with work coaches and interview assistance. In addition, there is specific support targeted towards young people, people aged 50 plus and job seekers with disabilities or health issues.
In addition, the voluntary in-work progression offer started to roll-out in April 2022. It is now available in all Jobcentres across Great Britain. We estimate that around 1.2m low-paid benefit claimants will be eligible for support to progress into higher-paid work.
To further support parents into work, on 28th June 2023, the maximum monthly amounts that a parent can be reimbursed for their childcare increased by 47%, from £646.35 for one child and £1,108.04 for two or more children to £950.92 and £1,630.15 respectively. Importantly, we can now also provide even more help with upfront childcare costs when parents move into work or increase their hours.
To support those who are in work, on 1 April 2024, the Government will increase the National Living Wage for workers aged 21 years and over by 9.8% to £11.44 representing an increase of over £1,800 to the gross annual earnings of a full-time worker on the NLW.
This government understands the pressures people are facing with the cost of living which is why we are providing total support of £104bn over 2022-25 to help households and individuals.
Included within this, to support low-income households with increasing rent costs, the government will raise Local Housing Allowance rates to the 30th percentile of local market rents in April 2024. This will benefit 1.6 million low-income households, who will be around £800 a year better off on average in 2024-25.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many paying parents had child maintenance arrears of more than (a) £1,000, (b) £5,000 and (c) £10,000 in each financial year since 2009-10.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
The Child Maintenance Service does not currently hold the information requested. The number of paying parents with arrears as of the 31st of March each year between 2018 and 2023 has been provided.
Number of Paying Parents | ||||||
Arrears | Mar-18 | Mar-19 | Mar-20 | Mar-21 | Mar-22 | Mar-23 |
More than £1,000 but less than or equal to £5,000 | 45,800 | 56,800 | 65,200 | 68,600 | 76,800 | 85,200 |
More than £5,000 but less than or equal to £10,000 | 6,500 | 10,300 | 13,600 | 15,900 | 18,100 | 20,600 |
More than £10,000 | 1,300 | 2,600 | 4,300 | 6,000 | 7,500 | 9,200 |
Source: Child Maintenance Service Administrative Data | ||||||
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will make an assessment of the amount in child maintenance payments (a) not paid by paying parents and (b) not received by receiving parents when the paying parent's income has been misreported in each financial year since 2009-10.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
The Child Maintenance Service does not hold the information to fully respond to the request.
The Department publishes quarterly Child Maintenance Service (CMS) statistics, with the latest statistics available to the end of December 2022 here. Table 6 of the National Tables provides the total amount of uncollected child maintenance from March 2015 – December 2022.
Asked by: Afzal Khan (Labour - Manchester Rusholme)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that paying parents report their income (a) promptly and (b) accurately to the Child Maintenance Service.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
As a principal part of the service design the Department uses data from HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) and its own benefits data to assess 91% of Paying Parents earned income and benefit status, which are key parts of the maintenance calculation.
Additionally, the Child Maintenance service allows both paying and receiving parents to request a change to the assessment if they believe that the paying parent’s income has changed by more than 25% compared to the most recent figures provided by HMRC. This can be done online, over the telephone or in writing. Customer communications highlight the obligations of parents to provide information and the consequences of failure to comply or misrepresentation.
Where a paying parent receives unearned income which can be legally considered in assessing child maintenance either parent can request a variation to the normal maintenance calculation. Cases involving suspected misrepresentation or fraudulent behaviour can be looked into by the Financial Investigation Unit (FIU). This is a specialist team which can request information from financial institutions to check the accuracy of information the CMS is given.