THE FIGURES are a wake-up call to us all. It means that we all probably know someone who is struggling to make ends meet. And yet it is a problem that’s hard to talk about.
New research, highlighted on our front page this week, suggests that one-in-six children in our borough live in poverty.
Organisations that help, including the foodbank, report a rising demand as the coronavirus puts pressure on the economy.
With the Government furlough scheme ending next week, that is only going to get worse.
The silver lining is that the poverty levels in Wokingham borough are lower than in other parts of the Royal County. In part, this is due to the borough council maintaining its services despite the budgetary pressures it has faced over years.
It can be argued that austerity measures introduced by the coalition government of 2010 – seeing the axing of Sure Start centres, for example – have made it harder to spot the root causes.
More needs to be done at government level to tackle child poverty. It can start by heeding Marcus Rashford’s call for funding for meals outside of school terms.
The figures are a shock, and they are a call to action. Playing a blame game helps no-one, least of all – our children.
