Media Release

Summit Delegate Disagrees With Benefit Recommendations

Thursday, 17 September, 2009

A Child Poverty Summit convened by the Every Child Counts organisation has recommended higher core benefit levels.

As one of the 70 invited delegates attending the Summit welfare commentator Lindsay Mitchell says she did not agree with this proposal. "As a participant in the Social Exclusion workshop which made this particular recommendation, I argued against it. There are at least nine international research papers that show that an increase in benefit levels increases the number of children born outside of marriage or a stable relationship. This has the effect of drawing more children onto benefits, putting even more children at risk of the unintended consequences the Summit wants to reduce."

"Additionally, the figures supplied by Every Child Counts show that of the children living below the poverty threshold 65,000 were in sole parent families. I emphasised that there are currently around 165,000 children reliant on a DPB income. If the majority are not below the poverty threshold, why increase the level of the benefit across the board? Factors beyond the income level are responsible for the poverty."

Neither of these objections was dealt with indicating that the recommendation is more about ideology than enduring solutions.

Lindsay Mitchell
Welfare Commentator

ends

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