SHOCKING new figures reveal that a Newport estate has the highest level of child poverty in Wales.

In Tredegar Park ward, which includes Duffryn, 81.7 per cent of children are judged to be living in poverty.

Councillor Garry Brown, who represents the ward, was saddened but not surprised by the research carried out for Save the Children by the University of York.

"It has been building up over a number of years," he said. "Living below the poverty line eliminates them from many activities which other children enjoy and gives them a bad start in life."

Councillor Brown believed Community First funding, which helps needy areas, was the way forward.

Save the Children UK and Europe policy manager Madeleine Tearse said the study was the first to deal comprehensively with all the factors of child poverty.

The new report found that Welsh children were the poorest in Britain.

In 2000, 33% of Welsh children were living in poverty, compared to 30% each in England and Scotland.

It also has the highest rate of teenage pregnancies and the worst alcohol and drugs problems among children in the UK.

The report showed that 35.2 in every 1,000 Welsh young women under 20 get pregnant, compared with just 26.1 in Northern Ireland and 28.8 in England.

Figures from 1996, the most recent for Wales, show that 28% of boys and 22% of girls aged 15 had used drugs in the last month, compared with English figures for 1998 of 19% for boys and 16% for boys.

The report showed 53% of boys and 36% of girls aged 15 in Wales drank alcohol on a weekly basis. In Northern Ireland the figures were 33% and 20% for boys and girls respectively.

Wales also had the lowest number of 16 and 17-year-olds still in school (68.7%), followed by England, Northern Ireland and Scotland with the highest on 78.6%, and the highest proportion of 16 and 17-year-olds with no qualifications (8%).

* THERE is no official poverty line but the New Policy Institute defines it as £145 a week per household after housing costs (rent, mortgage, etc) are deducted.

The UK has the highest rate of child poverty in the European Union with just under a third of children living in households receiving below the average figure.

In one suburb of Swansea, only three per cent of children live below the poverty line while less than three miles away the figure for another area in the city was more than 80 per cent.

In Gerrard's Cross, North Buckinghamshire, only 0.5 per cent of children live below the poverty line while Whitfield South, Dundee, has the highest rate of 96.1 per cent.