There’s no quick fix for single parent poverty but there is a clear first step – Labour must take it

As 2024 draws to a close, research shows that the year will be topping the league tables for all the wrong reasons as poverty rates reach record highs. As with all inequalities though, the burden isn’t equally shared. And single parents are facing poverty at disproportionate rates.

Standing at 55%, almost double that of two-parent families, the single-parent poverty rate is high and rising. But despite the warning signs, the government’s initial plans for their child poverty strategy failed even to name single parents as a key group.

Look at any statistic and you’ll see the problems run deep – 73% of families with dependent children who receive universal credit are lone parents, while 63% of families with children living in temporary accommodation are single parents.

• I’m a single mum living in poverty. Worrying about how it affects my children keeps me up at night
• No mention of two-child limit on benefits in Labour’s ‘ambitious’ child poverty strategy

The single parent employment rate has decreased from 69% in 2019 to 66% in 2024. Even those who can work are increasingly finding it doesn’t solve poverty. Some 62% of those experiencing poverty live in families where at least one adult works part-time, up from 56% a decade ago.

Perhaps the most shocking part of these figures is knowing that they won’t shock anyone. By highlighting them, I risk adding to the apathy of a society anda government accustomed to the poverty-stricken single parent case study. But I’m not sharing these statistics to reinforce stereotypes, rather to highlight that they aren’t caused by chance. Single parent stigma and discrimination are age-old problems that are still fuelling these statistics today.

The landlord who refuses to show a single mother a property judges her in a similar way to the prospective employer who stops listening to her interview when they hear about her family circumstances.

And, as for a government that introduces policies designed to assess a family’s financial need and then provide them with significantly less despite knowing single parents – who face higher employment barriers – will be hardest hit, well, the less said about them the better. (If you’re after examples see the two-child benefit limit and the benefit cap).

The government’s overriding focus on its growth mission isn’t all that surprising given the UK has seen GDP growth lagging behind all but one of the other G7 nations in the period 2019-2023, but no economist can believe that trickle-down economics will make a meaningful dent to the lives of over half of all single parents who are experiencing poverty. 

There were glimmers of hope in Rachel Reeves’s first budget – not least the 6.7% rise in the national living wage. But without significant legal and regulatory reforms it’s all just tinkering around the edges of a system that doesn’t recognise, let alone support, single parent families.

While wages rising is a good thing, there’s been no action taken to address the baked in discrimination lone parents face daily. From the exclusion of childcare support for disabled single parents that couples in the same situation can claim, to the higher work requirements for single parents in receipt of universal credit who can’t benefit from the couple’s earning threshold.

While the Employment Rights Bill and Renters’ Rights Bill introduced into parliament this year both look promising, they won’t fully protect single parents from discrimination without additional clauses. And for that to happen there needs to be acknowledgment from those in power that single parents need – and deserve – change.

While Scotland is ahead of the curve on this one – the government there identified single parents as one of the six priority groups in their 2017 Child Poverty Act – Westminster is lagging behind.

The promise from the government of a national child poverty strategy, expected in spring 2025, remains the one beacon of hope to address the myriad of problems facing families experiencing poverty. Yet like many, I fear the funding attached to it will be woefully inadequate.

A single parent with one child is currently expected to survive on £681.37 a month (excluding housing costs) yet the weekly minimum income standard for a single parent and child exceeds this figure. It’s no wonder then that food bank usage is at a constantly evolving record high.

While the government has promised better employment support with the Get Britain Working white paper, that alone won’t solve the financial problems facing families – which requires significant government investment into our social security system too.

The challenges facing single parent families aren’t only financial. When I run focus groups with single parents as part of the child poverty strategy development process, it becomes painfully clear that the system is broken and the persistent stigma single parents face pushes them to the back of a seemingly never-ending queue.

There may be no quick fix for single parent poverty, but there is a clear first step. The government must seek to understand the reality facing single parents, including the emotional, physical, and financial impacts.

Having no partner to shift-parent with isn’t just exhausting, it makes everything more challenging, from accessing basic health services to making it to work on time. The wide-reaching implications of that cannot be ignored.

The government has shown they understand the importance of legal reform to protect renters and workers rights’. As we move into 2025, they must now give single parent families similar protections by undertaking legal and regulatory reform to both prevent discrimination and address the root causes of poverty. Only then will the 3.2 million single parent families in the UK be able to flourish.

Ruth Talbot is the founder of the Single Parent Rights campaign.

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