The conservative Maxim Institute think-tank has joined the call for official targets to reduce child poverty.
The institute, which aims to promote research advancing marriage and the family as foundations of society, says in a new report that its research on poverty has exposed it to the lives of real people behind New Zealand's poverty statistics.
An unnamed person speaking of a South Auckland caravan park is quoted saying: "It's meant to be a holiday park where people stay for a time and leave, but it's turned into a village with 50-year-old caravans the size of a boardroom table housing a husband, wife and four kids."
Researcher Kieran Madden, who wrote the report, stops short of recommending that child poverty reduction targets should be enshrined in law, as recommended in 2012 by an expert group set up by Children's Commissioner Dr Russell Wills.
But he says the Government should extend its existing "Better Public Service" targets, which include increasing early childhood education rates and reducing long-term welfare dependency, to cover "reasonable time-specific targets aimed at reducing poverty". He says poverty should be measured by a similar range of measures as Dr Wills' experts proposed.
