4 Future perfect

The Conservative leader, David Cameron, has committed the Conservatives to abolishing poverty in the UK. A summary of his speech can be found at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7047193.stm This commitment appears to be more than a match to the Labour government’s pledge to end child poverty by 2020. Consequently, it would seem that whoever is in government, we at The Brightside Trust, and the bulk of the rest of the third sector, have at the most 13 years before our collective reason to exist will disappear. However, before everyone under the age of 52 rushes off to discover new challenges, I think we should check the small print. The full speech can be found at http://www.conservatives.com/tile.do?def=news.story.page&obj_id=139763&speeches=1
Limiting welfare, as a strategy to end poverty is, of course, nonsense, but as a way of getting some people to move into the workforce and out of poverty, has been shown to have some success during periods of full employment. In that regards, the Cameron policy is on a similar trajectory to that of the government. Unfortunately, it doesn't look to me as if the target of halving child poverty by 2010, which was the first and easiest part of this strategy, will be achieved. Today, the government are announcing a new unit to co-ordinate their anti-poverty drive, this will involve officials from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and the Department for Children http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7066838.stm I’m not sure what they plan to do, but the link with the DWP suggests a further increased emphasis on getting carers into work. This is a worthwhile enterprise, which I could see The Brightside Trust being involved with, but ending child poverty by 2020, I'm afraid there's a lifetimes work here.