New data published by the Government suggest that child poverty is on the increase. Hayley Bennett, Jed Meers, Joe Pardoe, Rhiannon Sims and Beth Watts-Cobbe argue that while the local welfare of devolved nations can act as a last resort safety net, its provision hugely varies across the country and cannot on its own tackle child poverty.

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According to newly released data, 4.5 million children in the UK are living in poverty (approx. 30 per cent of all children). Following the Chancellor’s inclusion in this week’s Spring Statement of a further £8.3 billion of social security cuts, analysis by the Resolution Foundation suggests the number of people in relative poverty may increase by 250,000 including 50,00 children. This increase is problematic for the UK Labour Government who, in 2024, announced a pledged to reduce child poverty via a new child poverty task force and a new Child Poverty Strategy (due out in Spring 2025).

The Government committed to this being a “shared endeavour across all parts of the UK” and to learning from action already underway in ,Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland,” areas of the UK with a wide range of relevant devolved policy competencies. Ensuring UK-level social insurance and social assistance policies are adequate is essential for addressing child poverty, for example via reforms to Universal Credit, or Child Benefit. But reducing child poverty is a multi-level agenda, involving various organisations, policies, and practices operating at UK, devolved, and local levels. Local welfare can help alleviate child poverty and respond to place-based problem pressures, but it’s essential that localised anti-poverty services and cash transfers are well funded and adequately supported.   

While the South East of England is the wealthiest UK region, many of the worst affected local authorities are in London (driven by high housing costs), with almost half of children in Tower Hamlets living below the poverty line.

Child poverty rates and associated policy responses and services vary a great deal across the UK, driven by differences within countries, between regions, and across localities. Research by the Health Foundation identifies substantial regional discrepancies. For example, much of the North East of England and Wales have high rates of child poverty (and noticeably higher than the South East of England). Child poverty rates also tend to be higher in urban areas. According to Action for Children and the End Poverty Coalition, while the South East of England is the wealthiest UK region, many of the worst affected local authorities are in London (driven by high housing costs), with almost half of children in Tower Hamlets living below the poverty line after accounting for housing costs. In Lancashire, the urban areas of Preston, Pendle, Hynburn, and Blackburn with Darwen have child poverty rates ranging from 29 per cent to 43 per cent, while the child poverty rate in the neighbouring rural Ribble Valley is just 12 per cent. It is unsurprising therefore that policy responses and service provision to address child poverty may vary by place as devolved governments and local authorities experience different services demands but we need to carefully consider how localisation might increase inequalities. 

Local welfare – although patchy and still a small proportion of the overall welfare system – is playing an increasingly important role in many parts of the UK.

The importance of local welfare

Localised responses to child poverty can take many forms, including targeted support services or local welfare assistance in the form of cash transfers or emergency crisis support. For instance, the combined Household Support Fund and Discretionary Housing Payment budgets account for £1 billion of spend each year, with additional Local Welfare Assistance schemes on top, and over 3.6 million claimants are currently in receipt of Council Tax Support in England. The recently renewed Holiday Activities and Food Programme – one of a number of other schemes often conceived as sitting outside of the core “local welfare” canon – accounts for an additional £200 million each year. Local welfare – although patchy and still a small proportion of the overall welfare system – is playing an increasingly important role in many parts of the UK. However, there is substantial variation in local powers and services across the four nations, indeed in Northern Ireland local government has practically no responsibility or dedicated resources for local welfare provision and does not administer schemes similar to those mentioned above.

Spatial differences in local welfare exist for many reasons. First, the previous Coalition Government sought to explicitly rescale some aspects of social security via the Welfare Reform Act (2012). The Act restructured the provision of emergency funding away from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) by abolishing Council Tax Benefit and the Discretionary Social Fund, and instead tasked local authorities in England with designing local provisions including Discretionary Housing Payments (that were often used as a response to reduce the hardship people felt from other aspects of welfare reform, such as the Bedroom Tax). Hick describes these changes as creating “a new, localised social security terrain” in England. 

Second, devolved governments have also reshaped social security provision by delivering decentralised welfare in different ways or by choosing to offer more than the UK-wide provision. For example, in Northern Ireland since 2017, a non-repayable discretionary grant has been available through the Universal Credit Contingency Fund, as part of a wider package of welfare reform mitigation measures, to alleviate short-term financial hardship experienced by UC claimants while they are waiting on their first payment. There have been formal developments in devolved and localised social security in Scotland since the Smith Commission (2014) for example the Scottish Government’s introduction of a Scottish Child Payment. In relation to local welfare, activities that are highly localised to local authorities in England are often managed and designed by devolved governments. For example, where the DWP decentralised Discretionary Housing Payments to local authorities in England, these are administered by the Northern Ireland Housing Executive in Northern Ireland.

Local welfare assistance often functions as a “last resort” for families experiencing destitution or acute need leading to local authorities increasingly responsible for administering emergency cash transfers and targeted support.

Third, there are also implicit forms of welfare rescaling where local actors step in to address local problems or perceived gaps in national welfare provision. This may also include responses to spatial market variations that shape the drivers of poverty including housing costs, childcare availability, or depressed local labour markets. Increasingly we see charities supporting families and children experiencing poverty through charitable giving or grant making practices, but what is available also varies by place (for example, see NPC Local Needs databank) and charitable capacity may not align with the geographies of need.  

What is local welfare for? 

Local welfare assistance often functions as a “last resort” for families experiencing destitution or acute need leading to local authorities increasingly responsible for administering emergency cash transfers and targeted support. We are currently part of the Safety Nets (Social Security in a Devolved UK) research project, which includes two research streams examining the design and administration of local welfare. One, led by the Resolution Foundation, involves a comprehensive examination of financial data on local welfare spending across these schemes in order to get a fuller picture of the scale of local welfare assistance across the UK. 

There are concerns that rescaling welfare is a form of “austerity localism” whereby ideas of localism are accompanied by and anti-state agenda that emphasises community, voluntarism, and self-responsibility.

The second, involves a team of researchers examining how different local authorities across the UK design and deliver local welfare assistance, including issues around eligibility, application processes, and entitlement, and local anti-poverty strategies. We’re closely examining who gets what, when, where, and how. Even within England our early research reveals notable variation, including how local authorities have differing commitments to addressing child poverty, with some areas “topping up” discretionary provision in order to expand their offering to local families. We also recognise that some local authorities may be struggling to deliver their statutory responsibilities and are therefore unable to invest in additional activities to address child poverty in their localities. 

As things stand, local welfare provisions are an important feature of the social security safety net, and some aspects and experiences of child poverty may benefit from localised responses.

Raising questions about localised inequalities are increasingly important. On the one hand, a strategic approach to addressing child poverty may require targeted investment in localities with the most need. On the other hand, there are concerns that rescaling welfare is a form of “austerity localism” whereby ideas of localism are accompanied by and anti-state agenda that emphasises community, voluntarism, and self-responsibility. Thus, offering a very limited response to child poverty made in the context of fiscal pressures on public expenditure (rather than addressing long-standing issues with UK social security, or cost of living crisis especially around affordable housing). The UK government’s commitment to increasing mayoral regions in England suggests that further spatial policy divergence may be a feature of the future. However, to undertake local and regional policy making and delivery effectively will need adequate resourcing to avoid becoming a problematic form of “austerity dumping”. Can socio-economic issues of labour market insecurity, work-care balance, long-term care needs, and financial insecurity really be solved at the local level? 

Local welfare provision, especially small scale and inconsistently funded, cannot fully address the drivers of child poverty. However, as things stand, local welfare provisions are an important feature of the social security safety net, and some aspects and experiences of child poverty may benefit from localised responses. Our research seeks to better understand variations in local welfare and support for families experiencing poverty, and identify what approaches might contribute to providing lifelines for families in need.

*Safety Nets project is funded by the Nuffield Foundation as “Social Security in a Devolved UK”, but the views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily the Foundation. The project is a multi-institutional and inter-disciplinary research and policy team, comprised of academics from seven universities across all four UK nations (University of York, University of Edinburgh, Heriot-Watt University, University of Salford, University of Cardiff, Ulster University, Oxford University), and with policy partners, Resolution Foundation and Child Poverty Action Group. You can register for updates here.

**We are collecting empirical data during 2025 about their design and administration of local welfare. If you’re working in a local authority and are interested in being involved or learning more please contact research fellow Rhiannon Simms (R.Sims@hw.ac.uk). 

All articles posted on this blog give the views of the author(s), and not the position of LSE British Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics and Political Science.

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