We lock up a very large number of young people in the United Kingdom. In England and Wales alone, at the time of writing, 2,183 children (aged 17 and under) are incarcerated. Those of us who have spent time working with such children cannot fail to wonder about the unhappy path of educational failure, almost invariably the first step into crime, conviction and incarceration. What produces this sense of alienation in such young people, which prompts them to put so little store by society’s rules? What can be done to prevent young people’s drift towards custody? Are there interventions we can make to help rescue children at risk of being pushed to the edge of society and reconnect them to the community, thereby preventing their future criminality?

In the wake of the UK’s Edlington Two – young brothers who inflicted violence on another pair of boys – we heard a lot from politicians about personal responsibility, and the need for decent schools with discipline at their core. Most of all, we were told that parenting is the answer, the one ingredient which can make that vital difference.

David Cameron has made plain where he stands, stating that, “the differences in child outcomes between a child born in poverty and a child born in wealth are no longer statistically significant when both have been raised by confident and able parents.” What matters, he claims, is not “the wealth of their upbringing but the warmth of their parenting.”

He’s quite wrong. It’s not that simple. Not that parenting isn’t important; parenting courses, including those that are thoughtfully and meticulously delivered in custody, can make a real difference. But research suggests that, at best, good parenting might make up half the damage caused by the disadvantage that is generally a consequence of child poverty. And poverty – by the government’s own figures – currently affects 2.8 million children in the UK in this, the sixth richest country in the world.

Child poverty in the UK is not simply relative; it is frequently absolute. And, contrary to what one might glean from the popular press, it is not confined to families living on benefits. Forty-two per cent of children living in poverty in the UK have one or both parents in work. Take, for example, a family of two parents and two children aged thirteen and fourteen. If dad is working for 40 hours a week but on the minimum wage, and if the family also apply for and obtain every benefit to which they are possibly entitled, they will still have to survive, after housing costs, on £308 a week. The minimum income standard for this family is £425 a week. That money needs to cover food, gas and electricity, the cost of running a phone, plus clothes, travel fares and recreational activities. The challenge is impossible and, when something unexpected occurs, debt beckons.

What does such a family do when the washing machine breaks or the winter gas and electricity bill is unexpectedly high? They borrow. But not from the high street banks – they shunned the poorest long before the credit crunch. These families often turn to doorstep lenders, the best known of which is Provident, described recently as – for its size – the most profitable bank in the world. Families can borrow a few hundred pounds in times of need, but they do so at a (potentially crippling) typical minimum APR of 272.2%.

I am not suggesting that the poorest children will automatically graduate to a life of alienation and crime. But anyone who has spent time with young offenders will see the reality that almost every one comes from a poor background. Institutions do their best but the harsh reality is that children in custody are the victims of multiple disadvantage, poor education (or none at all), and an upbringing characterised by a lack of ambition and, yes, poor parenting.

The really troubling thing about child poverty in the UK is that it has become generational. For those born in the 1950s, social mobility was within reach. Forty per cent of boys born in the fifties did considerably better in life than their fathers. Although it may not be getting worse right now, social mobility has slowed to an alarming extent. Boys born in the seventies were much less likely to do better than their dads.

Reducing inequality is the solution, not least for moral reasons. However, this is not only a moral issue, although when we think of Goldman Sachs senior staff nobly limiting their annual bonuses to just £1 million this year, we should reflect on the morality of that when compared with the poverty of the £300 a week family. But morality is only part of why we need to address income inequality. In the USA recently, Professor Harry Holzer estimated that the failure to address child poverty costs the US economy about 4% of GDP in lost tax revenues, additional health costs and increased costs to the criminal justice system.

Our coalition government must pursue the cause of good parenting. It can make a difference. But the greater imperative is to do something for the working poor – for the parents who go out to work each day but whose ability to raise their children in any sort of comfort is savagely diminished. If we want to address the alienation of youth, which propels so many into vicious cycles of crime and recrimination, we have to do more to give the poorest children a better start in life.