The Executive parties arranged a photo opp announcing an Anti-Poverty Strategy with no plans, details, …or strategy

On May 15th the executive announced that a draft anti-poverty strategy for consultation had been agreed, but since the press conference no document has been produced. To announce the long promised anti-poverty strategy without any plans, details or ring-fenced financial commitments is at best disingenuous at worst downright dishonest.

The apparent agreement to produce a draft strategy came two months after the High Court found the executive to be in breach of its legal obligation to adopt an anti-poverty strategy following action against the executive taken by the Committee on the Administration of Justice.

The legal requirement to produce an anti-poverty strategy was part of the Northern Ireland Act that followed the Andrews Agreement in 2006. In the ensuing 18 years no strategy has been published.

The May 15th announcement followed by no document comes at a time when poverty is increasing across Northern Ireland and working-class families are struggling to make ends meet. The pantomime politics of the executive parties are an insult to the intelligence and a betrayal of tens of thousands of people in poverty in NI.

Recent figures from the Department for Communities (DfC) suggest about 22% of children in Northern Ireland are growing up in poverty. The figures also indicate that about 23% of children (104,000 children) are in relative poverty and about 20% (90,000) are in absolute poverty. (Relative and absolute poverty are two main measures of living standards)

Families in poverty are unable to provide adequate food or clothing for their children. Food banks and other charities who provide essential goods to those in need are becoming overwhelmed. Citizens are quite rightly asking “ has our political leadership no shame” are they so out of touch with the reality that is the lived experience of those suffering from the neglect and the causes of poverty and deprivation?