Rural Community Network Responds to Anti-Poverty Strategy Consultation

Rural Community Network (RCN) welcomes the chance to respond to the draft Anti-Poverty Strategy. We have been closely involved in this work as members of the Anti-Poverty Strategy Group (formerly the Co-Design Group) and contributed to the drafting of the Recommendations Paper that has shaped the consultation.

The Recommendations Paper set out the building blocks of an effective strategy with clear design principles (rights-based, intersectional, resourced and cross-departmental) and six key outcomes:

1. The creation of an Anti-Poverty Act
2. Reduce child poverty by half over the strategy’s lifetime
3. Ensure no working-age person lives in poverty
4. Reduce older-person poverty by half over the strategy’s life
5. Create attractive, safe, accessible, welcoming and sustainable environments in the most deprived areas
6. Ensure equal access to high-quality public services

Listening to Rural Voices

To test the draft Strategy against these asks, RCN held three rural focus groups with our members. What we heard was consistent and clear:

• The Recommendations Paper provides a strong, ambitious vision.
• The draft Strategy, as it stands, does not go far enough and is not fit for purpose.
• Without a sharper focus on rural realities, the Strategy risks leaving rural people behind.

Our Key Rural Asks

• Poverty as a Cross-Cutting Executive Strategy

Poverty undermines outcomes in health, education, housing, justice, childcare, and employment. Tackling it requires joined-up action across all departments – not a single policy silo. For rural communities, where challenges like fuel poverty, digital exclusion, and lack of transport overlap, this joined-up approach is critical.

• A Rights-Based & Intersectional Approach

Rurality itself is a determinant of inequality. Long travel distances, patchy connectivity, and isolation all combine with other disadvantages. The Strategy must be rural-proofed through Rural Needs Impact Assessments and good quality rural stakeholder involvement.

• Better Data & Proportionate Funding

Rural households face higher living costs in fuel, transport, food, and services, yet this often goes unseen in broad statistics. We need better desegregation of rural/urban data to highlight the current hidden pockets of deprivation rurally.

• A Life-Cycle Approach

The current draft focuses too heavily on income poverty by way of a Poverty Cycle Approach. We are calling for a life-cycle approach, which considers people’s changing needs throughout their lives – from early years to older age – and works to prevent poverty being passed on across generations.

• Action Plans & Place-Based Interventions

High-level aspirations are not enough. The Strategy must include rolling action plans, with targets, budgets, and measurable outcomes. Solutions must be designed locally to reflect the realities of rural life: long distances, lack of transport, and higher living costs.

• Partnership with the Voluntary & Community Sector

Rural voluntary and community organisations are already trusted frontline providers. The Strategy must build on the 2025 Partnership Agreement with government, recognising the sector as a strategic partner and ensuring fair, long-term funding so that rural groups can deliver sustainable, locally driven interventions.

Conclusion

Our members value the Recommendations Paper and support its principles and they are equally clear that the draft Strategy needs much more ambition, detail, and rural focus.

This is a moment of opportunity. If the Executive commits to a cross-cutting, fully resourced Anti-Poverty Strategy that reflects both the Recommendations Paper and our key rural asks, we can deliver real change for communities across Northern Ireland.

Rural poverty is complex, hidden, and structural. It demands urgent action. By working together, government and the community sector can create a strategy that tackles inequality, strengthens local services, and ensures that no rural community is left behind.