Almost quarter of Yorkshire residents are living in poverty, charity report reveals

1.27million residents were living under the poverty line pre-pandemic according to the figures, with fears that the number will have dramatically increased over the past few months.

The poverty rate in Yorkshire at 24 per cent is slightly higher than the national average of 22 per cent.

And 32 per cent of the region’s children are living in poverty, compared with the national average of 30 per cent.

The government must urgently tackle poverty to alleviate the “relentless pressure” faced by low-income families, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation have said.

The regional data covers the period of 2016-2018, but the charity’s national data shows the situation has worsened for millions since the pandemic began in March last year.

Four in ten people on minimum wage face a high risk of losing their jobs during the pandemic according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

And the report shows racial disparity, with workers from black and minority ethnic backgrounds being 14 per cent more likely to lose their jobs.

A third of Bangladeshi and Pakistani workers were in poverty pre-pandemic, compared to 12 per cent of white workers.

The UK Poverty 2020-2021 report found that there was a rise in hardship before the pandemic hit, with almost a quarter of the lowest income workers living in poverty.

The charity say lowest-income workers have been disproportionately affected by job losses and uncertainty as they are more likely to work in hospitality sectors.

There are fears that disabled people are particularly vulnerable to lockdown poverty, with 45 per cent of working disabled people who were employed at the start of 2020 reporting no income by the middle of the year.

Shirley Widdop, 53, is a former nurse from Keighley who is living in poverty and cannot work due to living with degenerative cervical myelopathy.

She said: “Anybody can be swept into poverty due to circumstances beyond their control. I was a registered nurse. Due to a family breakdown, I was left homeless with three children. We were rehomed by a housing association.

“I’m clinically extremely vulnerable and if anything happens to me, there’s no one to look after my son.

“The pandemic has made everything worse. There’s no supermarket slots, and I am having to buy everything in bulk which makes it more expensive.

“I’ve relied on the Real Junk Food Project which provide pay as you feel food parcels. I would have been sunk in the first lockdown without them.

“I receive benefits but I was terrified of telling the DWP my disability was getting worse as it means going through the assessment process again.

“Any civilised society looks after its weakest members. Social security is a way of caring for those who have fallen on hard times. If you support people when they are at their lowest, they can continue to be contributing members of society.

“There is no shame in needing benefits. Poverty is not a personal failing.”

Helen Barnard, Director of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation said:

“It is a damning indictment of our society that those with the least have suffered the most before the pandemic and are now being hit hardest once again by the pandemic. The Government must now make the right decisions to avoid another damaging decade.

“It’s unacceptable that certain groups are bearing the brunt of the economic impact of COVID-19, and are now reeling from the latest blow of this third lockdown.”

The charity is campaigning for the temporary £20 a week Universal Credit increase, introduced in response to the pandemic, to be made permanent.

A spokesperson for the DWP said: “We are committed to supporting the lowest-paid families through the pandemic and beyond to ensure that nobody is left behind.

“That’s why we’ve targeted our support to those most in need by raising the living wage, spending hundreds of billions to safeguard jobs, boosting welfare support by billions and introducing the £170m Covid Winter Grant Scheme to help children and families stay warm and well-fed during the coldest months.”