Children living in the North of England face worse health and educational outcomes following the pandemic than youngsters elsewhere in the country, a major new report has warned.

The wide-ranging research involving more than 40 academics, titled Child of the North, has pointed out that rising inequality costs the economy in lost potential.

And it has come up with a series of recommendations on how to narrow the gap and improve the lives and futures of millions of children in the North East, North West and Yorkshire and the Humber.

The research shows that children in the North have a 27 per cent chance of living in poverty compared to 20 per cent in the rest of England and infant mortality and childhood obesity were higher in the North.

Prior to the pandemic, the North saw much larger cuts to spending on Sure Start children’s centres – on average, spending was cut by £412 per eligible child in the North, compared to only £283 in the rest of England.

And they missed more schooling in lockdown than their peers elsewhere in England.

Only 14 per cent received four or more pieces of offline schoolwork per day, compared with 20 per cent country-wide.

The North also recorded a number of extreme outliers with very high rates of children in care: in Blackpool, 223 per 10,000 children are in care.

There are 952 children’s homes in the North of England, and just 1,426 children’s homes in the whole of the rest of the country - a far greater number of children with the most complex difficulties are placed in the North West in particular, where there is a greater availability of residential beds.

Tooth decay amongst five-year-old children varies regionally and is highest in the North West (31.7 per cent) and lowest in the South East (17.6 per cent).

And at a local authority level, over half of five-year-olds (50.9 per cent) in Blackburn and Darwen experience tooth decay compared with 1.1 per cent in Hastings, East Sussex.

Food insecurity is higher in households with children compared to the wider population – and it is higher in the North of England compared to the rest of England.

And pre-pandemic, government data showed that the prevalence of low and very low household food security was 11 per cent in the North East and 10 per cent in the North West of England, compared to 6 per cent in the South East and 8 per cent in England as a whole.

When marginal food security is considered, the prevalence rises to 18 per cent and 17 per cent for the North East and North West respectively, compared to 11 per cent in the South East, and 14 per cent for England as a whole.

By the second half of the 2020 autumn term, primary pupils in the North East and North West experienced the greatest loss in reading in the country, of 2.0 and 1.9 months respectively.

The children of the North of England are increasingly ethnically diverse and all Northern regions include local authorities where ethnic minority children make up a high proportion of the local population, including Manchester (64 per cent).

And during the pandemic, children in the North were lonelier than children in the rest of England.

A total of 23 per cent of parents in the North reported that their child was “often” lonely compared to 15 per cent in the rest of the country.

The study estimated the loss of learning in the North, experienced over the course of the pandemic, will cost an estimated £24.6billion in lost wages over lifetime earnings.

One of the report’s authors Kate Pickett, Professor of Epidemiology from York University, said: “Levelling up for the North must be as much about building resilience and opportunities for the Covid generation and for future children as it is about building roads, railways and bridges.

“But the positive message of this report is that investment in children creates high returns and benefits for society as a whole.”

Public health professor Clare Bambra, from Newcastle University, said: “For too long, a lack of investment in key services in the North have meant that our children have suffered disproportionately.

“They are more likely to suffer ill health, to have lower educational attainment, and to live in care or poverty.

“The Covid-19 pandemic has worsened these inequalities and it will cast a long shadow across generations unless we act now.”

The authors made a wide range of recommendations including calling for a £10 per child per week uplift in child benefit, bringing in free school meals and permanently feeding children during holidays, a campaign England footballer Marcus Rashford has led in the past.

The report was produced by the Northern Health Science Alliance and N8 Research Partnership.