Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
A child poverty advocate says Social Development Minister Louise Upston made no mention of weakening the government's poverty targets when they met last week.
In 2021 the government set targets of reducing the number of children experiencing material hardship from 13.3 down to 9 percent by 2023/24. The government's new target for 2026/27 is 11 percent.
Upston has rejected criticisms of lowering the targets, saying they are now achievable and ambitious.
The earlier targets for low-income households on the before-housing costs measure was set at 10 percent, but the new one is for 12 percent.
The target for low-income households on the after-housing costs measure went from 15 percent to 14 percent.
Upston made the change through a Gazette notice on 27 June, 2024. In Question Time, Green MP Ricardo Menéndez March asked why.
The minister said it was because child poverty rates had worsened the previous year, so the previous targets were "miles behind what was forecast when the last government originally established the targets".
The child poverty report released alongside the Budget in May showed that although that target had reduced to 10.5 percent in 2021/22, it went back up to 12.5 percent in 2022/23. The AHC measure went from 14.4 percent to 17.5 percent and the BHC measure went from 11.7 percent to 12.6 percent.
The report said the changes reflected "at least in part, the impact of high inflation on the cost of living, which has made it harder for families to afford the basics in the year to June 2023".
Upston said the new target was "both ambitious but, importantly, achievable".
Child Poverty Action Group executive officer Sarita Divis told Morning Report on Friday she was "shocked" not only by the changed targets, but the lack of fanfare.
"There was no press release or any kind of indication. In fact, CPAG and some organisations on the frontline of child poverty, we just met with minister Upton last week and we talked a lot about the child poverty targets, and this wasn't mentioned at all."
Divis said the change meant the government would "accept" an extra 17,350 living in poverty on top of the previous target, set by the previous Labour government.
"We're saying to these children, 'We see you, we know you exist, but we just don't think we can help you. Maybe someone down the track will.'"
Divis said child poverty indicators were "tracking alright, we were going down" until this year.
"So this is a point where you sort of say, 'OK, we need to do something about it, and we need to do a concerted effort.' So I'd like to say to the minister, you know, I can accept that there's different opinions on how we're going to reach the goal of halving child poverty, but reducing the target is not a solution. It's basically giving up."
'Complete and utter disregard'
When reporters asked Upston about the change, she said it was "sort of an administrative thing really".
"What we're focused on, as I said, Budget '24, dealing with the cost of living, providing tax relief and family boost, those are the practical things that make a difference in reducing the number of children living in poverty. That's what we're focused on, that's what I want to keep doing.
"What we wanted to do was set a target not just based on the last target, but based on where we are today."
Ricardo Menéndez March. Photo: VNP / Phil Smith
Labour and the Greens said the government was shifting the goalposts and diluting the targets to make them easier for the coalition to achieve.
"The government has watered down our child poverty targets by stealth, a decision that will plunge thousands of children into material hardship," March, the Green Party's social development spokesperson, said.
"There has been no announcement and they have shown no accountability for this. This is just the latest example of the government's complete and utter disregard for our communities. This decision shows the government is comfortable with nearly 17,000 more children being in material hardship."
Labour social development spokesperson Carmel Sepuloni said it was a new low for the National-led government.
"They have already made a conscious decision to increase the number of children in poverty by changing the way benefits increase to pay for tax cuts, we knew that they were plotting something callous," she said.
"Officials warned the Government the number of children living in poverty would likely increase by 7000 in four years as a result of these benefit indexing changes. One estimate predicted that as many as 13,000 extra children would be in poverty by 2028."
"In Budget 2024 the Government made tax changes knowing that 9000 beneficiaries would be worse off, did nothing to ease cost-of-living pressure and is letting unemployment continue to rise."
The Child Poverty Reduction Act 2018 also requires the minister to "promptly after setting or changing targets, present to the House of Representatives a copy of the targets or changes". This week was the first sitting week since the changes were brought in.
