One-in-five Irish children live in poverty

MORE than 100,000 children have been removed from living in poverty over the past decade as a result of targeted Government action, the Minister for Social Affairs Seamus Brennan claimed yesterday.

Significant progress, he insisted, had been made in tackling the problem of child poverty — despite new research which shows that almost one-in-five Irish children experienced income poverty for periods in excess of five years.

A study by the Combat Poverty Agency, published yesterday, showed that around 182,000 children came from families with less than 60% of average incomes.