Cost-of-living: Judgment reserved in anti-poverty strategy challenge

Emma Cassidy, senior engagement lead for Public Interest Litigation Support, which is supporting CAJ, said the group was “challenging nearly two decades of delay”.

She said she hoped the court would “compel” politicians to take action.

“We are still in the grips of a cost of living – or cost of survival – crisis and there’s no plan of how this is going to be sorted out,” she said.

“It sounds bizarre if it wasn’t so serious.”

John Patrick Clayton from Unison described a strategy as “absolutely vital”.

He said he hoped today was an “important step” towards it being taken forward by the Executive.

He added that tackling poverty needs “to be collectively taken forward by the executive as a whole” and a “strategy is the right way to do that”.