BRITAIN is suffering “shameful and growing” levels of child poverty but single parent families are suffering most, new research has shown.

Gingerbread, the charity for single parents, blames the government’s Child Maintenance Service (CMS) which it says is letting single parent families down badly and is in desperate need of reform.

The Gingerbread report, which is supported by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, reveals that a record 30 per cent of children in Britain now live in poverty.