The scandalous truth about Birmingham's child poverty emergency laid bare

In a landmark BirminghamLive project, we expose the scandalous impact of soaring inequality and poverty on our cherished children - and demand urgent action

The scandalous reality of life for soaring numbers of children living in poverty in Birmingham is exposed today in a landmark BirminghamLive investigation that shows it is a 'pandemic' that's out of control.

The numbers of children affected has rocketed in under a decade, with more kids feeling the pain of poverty today in the city than at any time since modern records began. The rise is huge - from 27% of children in poverty in 2015 to 46% today.

We found every aspect of the lives of our city's poorer children is touched - from housing to health, access to youth and children's services, educational achievement, safety and crime.

Our full report can be accessed here. We urge you to read it in full to get a true picture of child poverty in Birmingham today.

READ MORE: 11 facts that show Birmingham has a child poverty emergency

We are now pressing the Labour Government to act urgently to help our city address this scandalous situation. As they gather in Liverpool this weekend for their first party conference since taking power, Birmingham Live will be there to urge ministers, local MPs and councillors to help heed our plea for action on behalf of the city, built around eight asks:

• End the two-child benefit cap
• Provide free school meals to every child in poverty
• Create a city “aid bank” for baby and child essentials
• Protect children’s and youth services spending
• Create a permanent, multi year Household Support Fund and, additionally, restore Discretionary Housing grants
• Set up child health and wellbeing hubs in our most deprived neighbourhoods
• Appoint a Birmingham child poverty tsar
• Provide free public travel for young people

You can read more about each of these asks, and the evidence backing them up, here.

In our two month probe we found Birmingham's children stuck in cramped, cockroach-infested B&Bs for months, hospitalised from the effects of damp and mould on their asthma, going hungry and cold in overcrowded homes and exploited by criminals - with poverty the common thread.

Distressing individual stories are just the tip of the iceberg. Reach Data Unit crunched the numbers and interrogated the data to find that Birmingham's child poverty problem is growing, and we are 'overtaking' other cities and towns. Ten years ago, Birmingham had the eighth-highest child poverty rate in the UK - now it’s third.

We need answers about why Birmingham has fared so badly compared to other local authorities on this measure.

Ladywood and Hodge Hill and Solihull North constituencies are the worst hit areas of the city, with 57% and 49.9% respectively of children in poverty. But nowhere is untouched - even in least affected Sutton Coldfield, one in ten children is now being raised in poverty.

Within each of those constituencies are pockets of significant deprivation. Two in three children living in poverty in Birmingham come from a working family (66%). We found that's because local wages are badly lagging behind the costs of living, including food and rent, despite work to make Birmingham a Living Wage City.

Birmingham: A Child Poverty Emergency

Child poverty is soaring in Birmingham and without urgent change, will only get worse. Having worked with charities and community groups, BirminghamLive is campaigning for the following changes to start to turn the tide:

1. End the two-child benefit cap
2. Provide free school meals to every child in poverty
3. Create a city “aid bank” for baby and child essentials
4. Protect children’s and youth services
5. Create permanent, multi year Household Support Fund and give more Discretionary Housing grants
6. Set up child health and wellbeing hubs in our most deprived neighbourhoods
7. Appoint a Birmingham child poverty tsar
8. Provide free public travel for young people

You can see why in more detail here.

Read our full report Birmingham: A Child Poverty Emergency here.

What you can do to help.

We found child poverty in Birmingham is also a race issue. In all but one of the 10 wards of the city most affected by child poverty, the population is largely Asian/Asian-British and Muslim; in the tenth the population was largely Black and Asian. Any solutions that fail to address the intersection of poverty and ethnicity are ultimately destined to fail.

Our findings around the impact of poverty on children's health are startling. Poor children in Birmingham are much more likely to have a poor diet, rotten teeth, and suffer the ill effects of indoor and air pollution, than better off peers.

We learned of children hospitalised because of asthma exacerbated by their damp home; and that constipation caused by poor diet is a major cause of GP and hospital visits. But worst of all, we found poor children are dying prematurely as a result of poverty.

"We are in a poverty pandemic and, yes, children are becoming seriously ill or dying because of poverty,” said one medic, Dr Chris Bird, a consultant in emergency medicine at Birmingham Children's Hospital. We know he speaks for many in the NHS and public health sectors.

Birmingham's dire shortage of social and affordable housing, and the poor quality of some of the homes that do exist, has a frightening knock-on impact on our children, our investigation found.

The number of children now living in temporary homeless accommodation in the city has soared, from 1,218 children in 2010 to 10,176 this year. Many of them are stranded in B&B rooms by the council as it has nowhere else to send them. Once an emergency bolthole for a few days, the average stays for many families are now measured in months.

A move to a flat or house in the city is not necessarily a positive either. We found more than half, or 31,000, of the city council's own housing stock fails to meet Decent Homes Standards. We also found that housing benefit paid out to landlords is not subject to any condition checks, and is instead based on the value of the property - opening the door to exploitation.

Want to take action? - Contact your MP!

We met families living in council and private properties with the ceiling falling in or mould so deep on a wall that it was hard to breathe. The soaring number of food parcels given out by foodbanks points to another issue; the prevalence of food poverty in the city.

School teachers, often the people with most direct contact with young people beyond their parents, told us of being reduced to tears by the sheer weight of poverty sitting on children's shoulders. Our report highlights how multiple problems and funding challenges were already playing out in the city when a new bombshell dropped last year which has made everything worse.

The desperate financial situation facing Birmingham City Council, which declared its de facto bankruptcy last September, has been devastating, with fiscal plans torn apart and more jobs and services slashed. Children’s, youth and early help services are being decimated as part of the near-£400m of cuts lined up by the Labour council for this year and next. New research by the University of Birmingham shows the cuts will fall heaviest on those with the lowest incomes.

A full inquiry into the council's collapse is still awaited that will establish how big a part was played by austerity cuts versus poor local leadership, bad decisions and a lack of innovation and transformative ideas locally. In the meantime, the cuts and council tax rises fall on blameless residents.

Our investigation also found hope, in abundance. Frontline workers, teachers, charities, volunteers, NHS and council staff, faith leaders, play workers, parents and young children themselves are leading the charge - they are saying much more needs to be done, but they are not passively waiting around. The city's schools, voluntary, faith, social care and third sector, some working in collaboration with the council and NHS, some going it alone, are plugging the gaps as best they can.

Read more: What you can do to help

Innovative schemes are under way to address bed and food poverty, to help families cope with damp and mould and to support the hardest hit communities. This summer, free playschemes and free lunches took place across the city to try to reach as many kids as possible.

The council and Birmingham Children's Trust say they are taking steps to try to tackle many of the issues we uncovered, some in collaboration with partners across the city. James Thomas, Birmingham Children’s Trust Chief Executive, told us he believed Birmingham faces many of the same challenges as other similar cities in England "but due to the size of the population some of these challenges, including child poverty, are bigger."

He said: "Addressing child poverty in Birmingham will not be something done overnight, or by any one organisation in isolation. We are pleased to see BirminghamLive highlighting this issue and look forward to continuing to work with statutory and voluntary partners across the city who we know share our commitment to improving the lives of children and families.”

Cllr Mick Brown, city council Cabinet Member for Children, Young People and Families, Labour, said: “That 46% of children in Birmingham grow up in relative poverty is a scandal. As a city, we have a responsibility to change this, and I will use my position to work with the Labour Government, and our Labour Mayor, to bring children out of poverty. Child poverty is a complex matter, rooted in poor housing and poor health, and these are the factors that we must tackle if we are to make a lasting change across the city.”

We hope our findings act as a reality check for those with the power to influence change. We are challenging them to address the issue, with urgency.

While we agree with campaigners who say we don’t need any more ‘sticking plaster’ remedies for the deep rooted inequalities that underpin the experiences of our families, we also found that today's children can't wait for more social and affordable homes to be built, educational inequalities to be sorted out, or for the economy to grow.

The Prime Minister has promised to investigate and fix child poverty, and has set up a taskforce led by ministers Bridget Phillipson and Liz Kendall who have declared it a ‘scourge’ and a ‘stain’ - there is ‘no greater challenge’, they say.

We are speaking for our city's children when we say 'we agree'. We are today issuing an invitation to the taskforce to come to Birmingham. We will show you how, and why, you need to act fast. We also urge city leaders to come together to come up with local solutions, urgently.

Today's children can’t afford any more delay.

If you want to comment on our report, or wish to share your own experiences, please get in touch. Mark your email 'Child Poverty'. Email newsdesk@birminghamlive.co.uk