Child Poverty Bill
10:41 am
Jamie Reed (Copeland, Labour)
If we were to look at the map of child poverty in the United Kingdom, we would see direct correlations between areas that suffered aggressive de-industrialisation during the 1980s and 1990s and pockets of severe child poverty—the most severe child poverty that we see today. There would be a lot of surprises, particularly with regard to rural areas.
I shall move on from one of the important points made by the hon. Member for South-West Bedfordshire about the barriers that are in the way. It is hard to address, from a technocratic point of view, some of the real cultural problems, not only with people who are in the benefits trap and in long-term unemployment, but with the significant numbers of people who, by contrast, do not come forward to claim what they are entitled to claim, and who, for whatever reason, will not enter the system and are falling outside the scope of the programmes that we are introducing. We do not seem to be addressing that real cultural issue when it comes to beating child poverty. How will we address it?