Child poverty - State is failing children and our future

Barnardos, the organisation dedicated to child welfare, has issued a children’s declaration in an effort to highlight the problems of child poverty in this country.

The aim is to inform the political parties so that they have an insight into those problems before drawing up their general election manifestos.

There are a million children in this country, and it is estimated that 110,000 of them — or one out of every nine — is living in poverty.

Many of the children do not have proper clothing and they cannot read or write after eight years of formal education. They live in substandard accommodation, without heat, cooking facilities, or somewhere to play, while almost 500 children are homeless.

It is an indictment of our affluent society that there are so many deprived children. They should be at the top of public priorities.

The political parties could demonstrate a determination to tackle this problem by pledging to elevate the Minister for Children to cabinet rank and to afford his or her office a greater role in the commissioning and delivery of services.

As almost a quarter of our population, children may be the voiceless in our democracy, but they are its future and our future.