Despite high levels of poverty being entrenched and on the rise, there has been an absence of a meaningful national policy agenda to address poverty in the UK for well over a decade.
With an absence of statutory guidance, adequate funding and direction from Westminster, addressing poverty in localities has been a significant struggle for local authorities. Local authorities and their public and voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) partners are increasingly recognised as having a greater role to play than simply dealing with the impact of poverty. In response to rising poverty levels, the Covid-19 pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis, an increasing number of local authorities have themselves adopted a strategic approach to poverty that seeks to focus on prevention and reduction of poverty as well as mitigation.
In this report we look at the number of councils in England who have an anti-poverty strategy in place or who have committed to introducing one in the next 12 months. It analyses rates of anti-poverty strategies by geography, political control and local poverty metrics.
Our findings suggest that while rates of anti-poverty strategies in councils in England are generally low, there are pockets of concentrated good practice in implementing strategic approaches to resolving poverty. Our findings highlight substantial scope for many more councils to introduce their own anti-poverty strategy.
