Church Group Calls on Government to Make UK Poverty History

Church Action Poverty (CAP) has called on the Government to step up efforts to end inequality in Britain after official statistics show that more than one in four children in the UK continue to live in poverty, reports Ekklesia.

|TOP|CAP commended the Government in a response issued yesterday for the progress it has made so far in tackling social poverty since 1997 but warned it must do more and move faster if it truly wants to ‘make poverty history’ in the UK.

“Although the government has now accepted the need for action to tackle the growing debt crisis in this country, it has still failed to set any targets for tackling extortionate lending and ensuring that the poorest households have access to affordable credit,” said Niall Cooper, CAP’s national coordinator.

CAP also criticised the Government for failing to include in asylum seekers in its anti-poverty strategy, with more and more “ending up absolutely destitute and reliant on the goodwill of refugee communities, churches and the Red Cross simply to be fed and housed”.

|QUOTE|The interdenominational group warned: “To achieve the goal of ending child poverty in a generation will require much greater political will and injection of resources to narrow the gap between the poorest and the rest of society.”

CAP will hold a conference next month in Manchester to explore the connections between the Make Poverty History campaign and moves to end debt, poverty and asylum destitution in the UK.

The event is co-organised by the Catholic Fund for Overseas Development, CityLinks, Salford Diocese Justice and Peace Commission and SPEAK.