Child poverty is worse than statistics suggest - The Times 5th November 2007

The measure of poverty used by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s researchers is not only that which the Government itself uses, but it is also internationally accepted as the standard for measuring changes in national poverty incomes over time (“Poverty Stricken”, leading article, Dec 3). Research shows that 60 per cent of median household incomes is not a good indicator of the low levels of living you refer to as poverty, because it generally underestimates what it costs to avoid the deprivations of food, clothing, shelter and access to common amenities needed to lead healthy lives and take part in society according to its values, which is what everyone who knows it means by poverty. That is why the Government itself has chosen a higher measure to try to capture the actual household income levels at which children experience the poverty you describe, 70 per cent of median household incomes together with deprivations of socially-defined necessities, as its preferred measure of child poverty.

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