The government's determination to redefine the word
poverty is likely to re-ignite the once red-hot political debate as to whether
poverty actually exists in Britain.
There will be many people reading this now who instinctively believe that you cannot have a breadline if everyone can afford bread. It is obvious that the UK does not suffer from the levels of squalor and starvation associated with poverty in previous centuries or less developed countries.
But the deep trepidation felt by those who campaign on behalf of the most deprived and vulnerable citizens is that in challenging the notion of "relative" rather than "absolute poverty', we fatally undermine our commitment to the poorest in our society.
Political acceptance of the concept of "relative poverty" was hard won. An influential voice in the campaign to redefine the word for the 20th Century was Professor Peter Townsend, a left-wing academic who founded the Child Poverty Action Group in 1965.
He argued that "individuals, families and groups in the population can be said to be in poverty when… their resources are so seriously below those commanded by the average family that they are in effect excluded from the ordinary living patterns, customs, and activities."
This idea was seen by conservatives, however, as a socialist ideological attack on their values.
On 11 May 1989, John Moore, the Secretary of State for Social Security stood up to make a speech:
"We reject their claims about poverty in the UK", he said of his government's critics, arguing that absolute poverty had been abolished and that relative poverty was no more than inequality. His sentiments echoed the words of a senior civil servant who had told a Parliamentary committee the previous year: "The word poor is one the government actually disputes."
The idea of relative poverty as a measure of social exclusion, however, had taken hold - not just in Britain but also at the Council of Europe, the United Nations and the OECD. It became the yardstick to measure the success of developed countries in dealing with deprivation.
The politics of poverty in the UK has moved markedly with both Labour and Conservative now considering it a real and debilitating consequence of social inequality. Tony Blair walked into No 10 in 1997 promising to "eliminate child poverty" by 2020. David Cameron walked into No 10 in 2010 promising his party was "best placed to fight poverty in our country".
Gone are the days when senior British politicians argue whether relative poverty exists.
There are, though, clearly weaknesses in a measure of poverty based on a proportion of middle income levels. Many find it perverse that if a country gets poorer, the number of people categorised as poor can go down.
In 1998 there were 3.4 million children living in households with an income of less than 60% of the median in the UK. The 2010 figures show this has fallen to 2.3 million - 600,000 short of where ministers had promised to be.
There are those who argue that we should consider it a failure but celebrate the progress made towards an obligation under the Child Poverty Act for the total eradication of child poverty in the UK.
Others, though, question how many of the 1.1 million children apparently lifted out of poverty are the result of a welfare-based conjuring trick.
In a speech the Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith makes the point that the focus on a poverty line based on relative incomes can skew welfare policy. "By this narrow measure, if you have a family who sit one pound below the poverty line you can do a magical thing," he said. "Give them one pound more, say through increased benefit payments, and you can apparently change everything - you are said to have pulled them out of poverty."
Indeed, today's poverty figures would appear to make his point. Comparing 2010/11 with the previous year, median household income has fallen. The 60% line has dropped from £259 pw to £251 pw.
Families whose income is between those two lines have technically moved out of poverty - even though they may still be struggling on exactly the same income.
It is this perverse outcome that drives the government's determination to redefine poverty - including a basket of other measures such as worklessness and drug dependency that, it is argued, give a more nuanced understanding of deprivation.
Millions of children in the UK are living in or on the brink of poverty, according to a report from the Campaign to End Child Poverty.
The umbrella organisation, which includes Barnardo’s, UNICEF, Save The Children and the TUC, has released data for every parliamentary constituency in the UK.
It found that in Birmingham's Ladywood constituency, 81% of children were living in low income families - the highest proportion in the UK.
Low income means families where no-one is working more than 16 hours a week or where the family is receiving the full amount of Working Tax Credit.
The campaigners say this is not a direct measure of exactly how many children are in poverty, but is a good indicator of which areas have the highest child poverty levels.
Claire's story of child poverty in the North East
It is hard for them to understand why they sometimes miss out on birthday presents, can't afford the right school uniform and struggle to pay for school trips:
[Ruby] knows, she could see me worrying about it. I couldn’t believe it when she said 'don’t worry mummy I won’t have a birthday present this year.' That made me cry so much, I felt so guilty for not being able to give them more.
His behaviour just got out of control at home – he had a really bad temper and was becoming violent, swearing, breaking things in the house on purpose.
Things are still hard, but when I look back, this time last year I sat here and cried buckets. There were more tears in my tea than water! But then the crying got less and less as I got more confident.
It’s reassuring knowing that staff like Sandra are there at Barnardo’s in case I need help again. We all know what it’s like living in a family – you can have rough patches when you don’t expect them. But at least now I know some techniques for how to get through these times – and there’s always someone at the end of the phone.
Barnardo’s has given me that confidence to carry on – confidence and hope really. They listen to me when I need it. I don’t feel on my own any more, I feel supported.
The terror is that a debate on the meaning of poverty will see, in their words, "the gains of the last decade squandered". Questions about the very existence of poverty, once the centrepiece of political debate in this country, may be asked once more.