The facts about poverty in the UK

Based on figures from December 2009

Official statistics

13.4 million

people in the UK live below the official poverty line

(60% of median household income)

Child poverty

The UK has one of the highest rates of child poverty in Europe.

Child poverty

In the UK 30% of children live in poverty, many well below the poverty line.

17 % of pensioners live in poverty. This number had been decreasing, but progress has stopped.

Older age poverty

2,800,000 households were in fuel poverty last winter.

More than 20,000 people died from the cold.

Fuel poverty

The Minimum Wage does not keep up with inflation in the prices of basic goods and services.

2,100,000 children living in poverty are in households where someone is in paid work.

Low pay

The real value of benefits has fallen. The unemployment rate is at its highest since 1997.

Benefits

The UK’s total personal debts now stand at a staggering £1,460,000,000,000.

It is very hard to get credit from banks.

People on low incomes are forced to use doorstep lenders and other high-cost credit companies instead.

These charge interest rates of 180%APR or more.

Debt

Asylum-seekers aren’t allowed to work but receive a third less support than UK citizens on Income Support. This amount is being reduced still further.

Most asylum applications are refused. Most refused asylum-seekers receive no government support.

Thousands of asylum seekers are hungry and homeless because of deliberate policy and bureaucratic errors.

Refugees and asylum-seekers

5% of households in overcrowded conditions. Reductions in housing benefit are likely to cause major problems.

Housing and homelessness

In Britain today, 1.5 million children – that’s one in seven – are suffering in bad housing.

Housing and homelessness

At 30 per cent, the poverty rate for disabled adults is twice that for non-disabled adults, a difference markedly higher than a decade ago.

A graduate with a work-limiting disability is more likely to be lacking but wanting work than an unqualified person with no disability.

Disability

Black and Minority Ethnic people are twice as likely to be living in poverty as White British people.

Ethnic groups

One of the worst aspects of being poor in a rich country is the feeling of being excluded and powerless.

Exclusion

The gap between rich and poor is greater now than at any time in the past 40 years. Research shows that inequality hurts all of us, rich and poor.

Inequality

Christians are called to stand in solidarity with people who are poor and excluded...

Action

If you oppress the poor, you insult their creator.Proverbs 14:31

Is this not the fast which I choose ... to divide your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into the house?Isaiah 58:6–7

The Lord will maintain the cause of the afflicted, and justice for the poor. Psalm 140:12

... and churches are well placed to find out the needs of their communities.

Action

Sign up for monthly email actions to combat inequality: http://bit.ly/closethegap_signup

Get your church involved:www.justchurch.org.ukwww.actionweek.org.uk

Help us give a voice to people in poverty. Make a donation:www.church-poverty.org.uk/give

www.church-poverty.org.uk0161 236 9321