Biting rats in cots, kids curled up sharing too-small beds and illnesses exacerbated by poor diet and damp - these are the kinds of stories that should have been consigned to Birmingham's history, along with back-to-back slums, rickets and chimneys belching out toxic fumes. But instead they are among the worryingly real examples experienced by youngsters across the city, England's children's commissioner heard during a visit to Birmingham.
Birmingham has emerged as the place where children are most likely to be living in poverty according to shocking new statistics, with the city now holding the abject title of 'child poverty capital'. Six out of the 10 most impoverished neighbourhoods in the country are in Birmingham - Heartlands, Alum Rock, Bordesley Green, Small Heath, Sparkbrook and Balsall Heath East and Ward End all have more than 60% of children living in poverty. And these are not isolated pockets of deprivation. Five out of the ten most impoverished constituencies in the country - the bigger areas represented by MPs - are also in Birmingham, with Ladywood the worst of all.
Now Dame Rachel de Souza, children's commissioner for England, has backed local calls for urgent action. Dame Rachel was in Birmingham this week to meet and listen to children talk about their lives and their hopes for the future. She spoke to young people at Colmore Junior School in Kings Heath and Nishkam primary and high schools in Handsworth. As well as hearing their thoughts on social media and AI, job aspirations and voting, she also spoke to them about the challenges they were experiencing - with getting a job, having money, conflict and hate among the issues they worry about.
In response, Dame Rachel told BirminghamLive she backed our call for urgent action to put young people at the heart of every decision made in the city. She said our call for an independent advocate for children in the city - made as part of our Child Poverty Emergency campaign - was one she would '100% support'. Dame Rachel took on the role of children's commissioner in 2021. The position had been created in the wake of the 2004 inquiry report into the horrific neglect and death of little Victoria Climbie. Since her appointment she has advocated for children and pressed successive governments to heed their voice in every policy.
Speaking to BirminghamLive she said: "I have seen poverty for children getting worse, particularly in big cities like Birmingham. One of the first cases that I intervened in when I became children's commissioner was in Birmingham." She said she used her right to intervene in the worst cases involving children to badger the city council to act. "A disabled child with a feeding tube was living in mouldy, terrible housing and could not get the council to move them even though rats were eating through the feeding tube at night. I had to intervene a number of times. We must never underestimate how difficult it can be for those living in poverty."
She said she had previously contributed to a poverty commission inquiry that saw her take 100 children, including some from Birmingham, into Parliament to have their voices heard. Among those she spoke to, she heard about "children needing to curl up at night because their beds are too small for them, I heard about a child too ashamed...to have a friend round because a rat had bitten their face in the night. There are stories that are Dickensian. It's a small proportion of all children but in one of the richest countries in the world this is not acceptable. No child in Birmingham or the country should be living in that level of poverty, we should not allow it and there is just no need for it."
"We are seeing it right across services, it needs massive action now. None of us should sleep while any children are experiencing this." She praised BirminghamLive's landmark child poverty emergency campaign, which she backed at the time, and said our unheeded call for a city version of her role, embedded in the local authority and regional combined authority, should be actioned. "Wouldn't it be great to have a local voice here, they would have our 100% support. It would only make decisions better if they (councillors) had to listen to the voices of children." Direct input from young people would be critical, she added. "One of the interesting things we find is just how different children's voices are if you take away the (adult) gatekeepers. There are too many people speaking for children rather than letting children speak for themselves."
