More than one in three Southampton children were living in poverty last year

Research from the End Child Poverty coalition has revealed that between 2018 and 2019 there were 16,074 children in Southampton who were living in poverty.

This is 34.7 per cent of children in the city who were growing up in poverty.

The charity has now expressed concerns that figures have increased further due to the coronavirus pandemic.

In 2014 to 2015 33.6 per cent of Southampton children were living in poverty after housing costs compared to 34.7 per cent in 2018 to 2019.

This means Southampton has the third highest child poverty rates in the South with Hastings being the area with the highest child poverty rates in the area.

A child is deemed to be growing up in poverty if they live in a household whose income is 60 per cent below the poverty line - the median income of households throughout the UK as calculated by the Department for Work and Pensions.

For a family of two adults and two children, 60 per cent of the median income in 2018 to 2019 was £432 a week.

Southampton Test MP Alan Whitehead said: "To support these children and families out of poverty the government need to make reducing levels of child poverty a priority as was done by the last Labour government.

"They could start by looking at overhauling the benefit system to make sure that people in and out of work are not at risk of poverty.

"In the short term they need to provide a better support package for those whose jobs have been affected by the pandemic."

Southampton Itchen MP Royston Smith said: "The Government is committed to supporting the poorest in our society.

"By introducing the National Living Wage we lifted incomes for the poorest while cutting taxes for millions.

"During the Covid crisis we have injected a further £6.5 billion into the welfare system to support those less well off families."

Although the new analysis - which take in housing costs for the first time - shows child poverty rates have been relatively stable across the South as a whole, they also show that there are areas where the combination of low income and relatively high housing costs are creating levels of child poverty that are as high as the hardest hit parts of the country.

In Eastleigh, there were 5,168 children who were living in poverty in the most recent year.

There were a total of 6,915 children living in poverty in the New Forest, and in Test Valley there were 4,624 children.

Anna Feuchtwang, Chair of End Child Poverty which commissioned the research, said: “The Government can be in no doubt about the challenge it faces if it is serious about ‘levelling up’ disadvantaged parts of the country.

"This new data reveals the true extent of the hardship experienced by families on low incomes – the overwhelming majority of which were working households before the pandemic.

"The children affected are on a cliff edge, and the pandemic will only sweep them further into danger.

“The Prime Minister must urgently admit to the true extent of child poverty in our country rather than resorting to his own inaccurate statistics.

"An ambitious plan to put this shameful situation right would be transformational for millions of children."