04 September 2019
The latest report in our annual Cost of a Child series finds that the overall cost of a child up to age 18 (including rent and childcare) is £185,000 for lone parents (up 19% since 2012) and £151,000 for couples (up 5.5% since 2012). The gap between lone parents’ actual income and what they need to meet family needs has grown sharply.
04 September 2019
The new school year is underway after the long summer break. This can be an expensive time for families. Most parents will have faced significant costs in recent weeks, from holiday childcare to new school uniforms. But to what extent are different families able to meet those costs? Every year for the past eight years, we have published research on what it costs to raise children from birth to age 18. This year the research coincides with the Spending Review, and puts a spotlight on how the government does support, and how it should support, families with the extra costs of children.
04 September 2019
Our annual Cost of a Child report this year finds that the overall cost of a child up to age 18 (including rent and childcare) is £185,000 for lone parents (up 19% since 2012) and £151,000 for couples (up 5.5% since 2012). The gap between lone parents’ actual income and what they need to meet family needs has grown sharply: lone parents working full time for the so-called national living wage ('NLW') are 21% (£80 a week) short of what they need – after paying for rent, childcare and council tax - a gap that has more than doubled from 10% since 2012.
20 August 2019
Financial support to low income families to pay for childcare through working tax credits is being replaced by the childcare element of universal credit. This Early Warning System report examines the impact of this change on parents and childcare providers.
03 April 2019
Children in low-income families are going hungry and are being exposed to feelings of shame and social exclusion because of lack of money and food, new research from UCL, published by Child Poverty Action Group shows.
This book brings the latest research on food poverty together with the voices of children experiencing food poverty first hand.
14 March 2019
If we had not included Portuguese young people in our cross national study of Families and Food in Hard Times*, the inadequacies in the free school meal system in England might not have been quite so obvious.
10 December 2018
In our Christmas appeal this year we mentioned Helen*, who we met at our food bank project in Tower Hamlets. Our advice helped Helen and her family get the financial support they needed. But we shouldn’t have met Helen in those circumstances.
19 September 2018
The proposed new poverty measure released this week by the Social Metrics Commission showed that whether or not you’re in poverty is determined by your income and your costs: not having enough resources to meet your essential costs is a defining feature of poverty.
20 August 2018
Our latest Cost of a Child report shows what it costs to raise a child to age 18, based on what the public thinks is a minimum standard of living. The overall cost of a child (including rent and childcare) is £150,753 for a couple and £183,335 for a lone parent.
