Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what progress her Department has made towards meeting the 2020 poverty reduction targets set out in the Child Poverty Act 2010; and if she will make a statement.

Tackling child poverty and disadvantage is a priority for this government. To do this requires an approach that goes beyond the safety net of the welfare state to tackle the root causes of poverty and disadvantage. This is why the income-related targets and the requirement to publish a child poverty strategy set out in the Child Poverty Act 2010 have been repealed. In their place, we introduced statutory measures to drive action on parental worklessness and children’s educational attainment – the two areas that we know can make the biggest difference to disadvantaged children. The Government has a statutory duty to report annually to Parliament on these indicators and will do so again in March 2018.

The links to the latest report and available data are below:

• Statutory report

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/workless-households-and-educational-attainment-statutory-indicators

• Children in workless households

https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/workingandworklesshouseholds/julytoseptember2017

• Children in long-term workless households

https://www.ons.gov.uk/releases/childrenlivinginlongtermworklesshouseholdsuk2016

• Children’s educational attainment at key stage 4 for all pupils and disadvantaged pupils

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/revised-gcse-and-equivalent-results-in-england-2016-to-2017