Too many children in Wales are living in poverty, says Jane Dodds.

The Mid and West Wales MS asked at the Senedd about the Welsh Government's child poverty reduction targets.

She said she had “absolutely no idea” what the aspiration of the Government is in terms of reducing the number of children living in poverty.

Ms Dodds said: “If I go to Scotland, I know that they want to reduce child poverty there by 10 per cent. If I look at New Zealand, they want to reduce it by five per cent.

“And, yet, in Wales, with one of the highest levels of children living in poverty, I have no idea what the Government's vision is in terms of reducing child poverty.

“On the other hand, if we look at organisations like Patriotic Millionaires UK—and they're exactly what they say on the tin—they say: ‘Raise taxes in order to fund our public services and help those living in the worst poverty’ - like our children across the UK.”

Ms Dodds said she had two questions for First Minister Eluned Morgan for which she wanted “yes” or “no” answers.

She said: “The first question is - will you tell Keir Starmer to tax the richest and scrap the two-child benefit cap? And will you introduce targets on reducing child poverty?”

Ms Morgan said that reducing child poverty is important to the Government.

She told Ms Dodds: “That's why we're investing more than £100 million a year in affordable child care for three and four-year-olds as well as £46 million in additional funding for childcare under Flying Start and free school meals.

“These Welsh Labour policies are vital to raise families out of poverty, which will help to reduce child poverty.

“The decisions on taxation and how he presents those is something that Keir Starmer has to determine for himself.

“Obviously, we in Wales have our opportunity as well. We have decided in this proposed budget that we will not be taxing the richest in our forthcoming budget—partly because we don't have as many rich people as perhaps we'd like in Wales to be able to access the kind of taxation that would be helpful to our public services.

“We have made it clear in the child poverty strategy that we have very clear intentions here. We already have national indicators, which will help us to measure our progress as a nation.”

Ms Morgan said the monitoring framework, which will inform the next steps, is due to be published this year.