AQW 49153/22-27

Ms Kellie Armstrong
Alliance Party
Strangford

Tabled Date: 19/06/2026
Answered On Date: 01/07/2026
Priority Written: No

Question:
To ask the Minister for Communities to detail any immediate steps he will take to address in-work poverty, given the growing proportion of children living in working households in poverty.

Answer:

My Department is leading on the Executive’s Anti-Poverty Strategy, which contains a wide range of actions to help those affected by, and at risk of being affected by, poverty in Northern Ireland, including children living in working households.

The Department for Communities supports low-income working households through Universal Credit and personalised work coach support, helping customers to increase earnings, progress in employment and overcome barriers to work.

I welcome the finding by Action for Children in their recently-published “Work Isn’t Working” report, which indicates that Northern Ireland has the lowest in-work child poverty rates in the UK and I along with my Executive colleagues intend to lower this even further through the development and implementation of a robust Anti-Poverty Strategy.