Churches, Charities Call on Government to End Poverty in UK by 2020

Religious leaders, charities, and campaign leaders have called on the government to end poverty in the UK by 2020. The National Poverty Hearing, the first gathering of its kind for 10 years, was held Wednesday at Westminster Central Hall to "challenge the myth that poverty is not real in the UK," organisers said.

|PIC1|Poverty campaigners, faith groups, trade unions and politicians attended the day-long hearing, including the Bishop of Hulme, the Rt Rev Stephen Lowe - standing in at the last minute for the Archbishop of Canterbury, the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, and Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks.

Bishop Lowe shared his eyewitness account of poverty on the council estate in Manchester where he lives, saying, "Behind many of the doors there is a great deal of poverty".

He added that family breakdown was rooted in poverty and that a living wage was necessary for a healthy family life.

"The Church of England wants to help open the eyes of this nation," he said.

"I was shocked by the assumption that poverty is 'all out there in Africa'," he said, referring to a film made by Oxfam which asked passers-by on the streets what they thought of poverty in the UK and screened at the hearing on Thursday. "Come to Manchester and open your eyes," said Bishop Lowe.

"You need to see, you need to open your eyes," he said.

The Church of England's Church Urban Fund has been helping the one in four children who live in poverty in the UK and the almost one in ten who live in severe poverty.

Chief Executive Fran Beckett said: "Last winter, 25,000 older people died of preventable cold related illnesses. Up to 20,000 destitute asylum seekers are reliant on the Red Cross, churches and charities for food and basic essentials. It is high time all faiths came together to condemn this."

Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor praised the "hugely important" role that voluntary organisations play in serving the poor in Britain.

"Voluntary organisations can help so many poor people in our country to get access to the benefits that are their rights."

He added that asylum seekers also had the right to access the "benefits which are due to them".

"We are all part of the human family, brothers and sisters before God," he said.

Rabbi Sacks called the lack of affordable, decent housing in the UK a "scandal" and criticised the "ongoing tragedy" of child poverty in Britain.

"Poverty is not just a lack of resources; it is a lack of the most basic requirements of dignity, freedom and self-respect," he said, adding that the eradication of poverty was "the responsibility of all, not just the government".

"We can achieve together what none of us can achieve apart," he said.

According to Niall Cooper, from Church Action on Poverty, which co-ordinated the event, around three million adults and 400,000 children are not being properly fed by today's standards while nine million people in Britain cannot afford housing that is properly heated, free from damp and in a safe and habitable condition. "In a rich country, this is a national scandal," he said.

He told Christian Today: "There is a danger that poverty in this country falls off the political agenda and also the church's agenda. One of the challenges of poverty in a wealthy society is that it is quite often invisible and people tend to think that because we are a wealthy society there can't be any poverty."

He added, "There are some big issues here where the churches need to see not only the human need but also the injustice and tackle it at that level as well."

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, offered this comment: "It is sometimes hard in our modern, highly connected world to keep in mind what the grinding effect of unremitting poverty can be.

"In turning a spotlight on poverty in our own communities, this hearing will, I hope, focus our attention on what still needs to be done to lift the burdens from those who can in all senses least afford to carry them."

Ten years on from Church Action on Poverty's first National Poverty Hearing, organisations including Shelter, Help the Aged, Church Urban Fund, End Child Poverty, Barnardos, Oxfam, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the Refugee Council and others staged yesterday's event.

It culminated with a call to politicians to commit to the goal of ending poverty in the UK by 2020.