Powys County Council should have a target to reduce child poverty, a meeting has heard, after a report showed the number of children living in “absolute poverty” in the county has risen to almost 5,000.

At a scrutiny committee meeting on 12 September, members heard the number has risen to 4,868.

The figure was contained in a report on the council’s Corporate and Strategic Equality Plan.

The child poverty measure included in the plan has no target and is for monitoring purposes only, members heard.

Cllr Gary Mitchell said the measure on child poverty is a “hugely worrying one,” would be a difficult one to “set a target” for, but should “really be a massive area of our focus.”

Head of children’s social services Sharon Powell said poverty is a “growing problem.”

She believed the council should have a target to reduce child poverty, but work would need to be done to “consider” what it would be and how it could be scrutinised.

Absolute poverty is defined as a household with an income of less than 60 per cent of the average for that area.

For Powys that figure would be just over £18,000 a year.