Keir Starmer Says There Is No "Silver Bullet" To Address Child Poverty
4 min read
Prime Minister Keir Starmer has said there is no quick-fix or "silver bullet" to addressing child poverty as he comes under increasing pressure to lift the two-child benefit cap.
Starmer spoke on Monday at the Farnborough Air Show as he launched a new skills programme set up by the Government. At the event he was pressed by journalists as to whether the Government was considering removing it: backbench Labour MPs have pressured the Prime Minister to make a clear commitment for months.
Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson told Sky News on Monday morning the Government was considering removing the measure to alleviate child poverty. Her statement was the clearest indication the Government would do so to date.
Phillipson, however, said it would be "very expensive" and the Government would need to "consider it as one of a number of levers in terms of how we make sure we lift children out of poverty.”
When asked on Monday morning later that day, Starmer said there was no "silver bullet" to ending child poverty.
"There is no silver bullet. If there was a silver bullet it would have been shot a very long time ago. It is a complicated set of factors that I know and I can see every day in my own constituency to do with pay, to do with benefits, to do with work, to do with housing, to do with education, to do with health," he said.
”That is why you need a strategy to deal with it which is why we have set up a very strongly chaired body to drive forward that work.
”So I am not surprised we are having a debate about it... What matters is that we turn that into action and reduce child poverty which is what I am determined that we will do.”
At the conference Starmer also officially launched a new body which would address the United Kingdom's "fragmented and broken" skills training system. Skills England, which was promised in Labour's manifesto, has been created to equip British workers with new skills for the economy's demands.
It has promised to fix the gap between central and local government and improve the working relatonship between the government, businesses and trade union.
One of the main reasons the body has been set up is to reduce Britain's reliance on overseas migration. The Office for National Statistics estimated that the UK's net migration level was 685,000 in 2023.
The Prime Minisiter told the audience in Hampshire said the "work of change" had begun and the "patient" rebuilding of Britain was underway.
"All too often, young people in our country have been let down, not given access to the right opportunities or training in their community. And that has created an over reliance in our economy on higher and higher levels of migration," he said.
"I do not for a second want to demean any of that. I do not criticize businesses who hire overseas workers, and I certainly don't diminish the contribution that migration makes to our economy, to our public services, and, of course, to our communities.
"Migration is part of our national story. It always has been, always will be. And yet, if you stand back... it cannot be right that some people don't get to feel the pride of making a contribution, the dignity of work.
"We won't be content just to pull the easy lever of importing skills. We are turning the page on that, but I want to be clear as well, we are going to make sure that there are highly motivated, ambitious, talented young people who want to work in your business."
Starmer was also questioned on the announcement that President Biden would stand down at the US election. Biden came under heavy pressure to step down after senior Democrat figures includng Barack Obama had been reported for the President to consider whether to press on and stand for re-election.
The Prime Minister said he believed it would not have been an "easy decision” for Biden, but said that he was looking forward to "working with him for the remainder of his presidency."
He refused to endorse Kamala Harris as the Democrat nominee and said that he would work with any future US president. The news comes as Donald Trump is widely expected to win the US Presidential race and serve as leader for another four years.
“My approach will be to respect that decision making and to be clear that we will work with whoever the American people elect into office, as you would expect, particularly given the nature of the Special Relationship between our two countries.”
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