Incomes for poorer families in Britain rose during the first year of the coronavirus pandemic as chancellor Rishi Sunak's emergency COVID support helped soften the impact, data shows.

The latest figures from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) showed that there were falls in the typical incomes after housing costs for people on middle and high incomes, of between 1% and 2%.

While this seems like a big slump historically, its small when compared to the economic disruption brought on by the crisis, given that GDP per capita fell by 10%, said the Resolution Foundation.

The statistics cover the financial year from April 2020 to March 2021.

For poorer households, incomes grew by around 4% at the 10th percentile of the income distribution, DWP said. This was driven by increases in benefits, like the temporary £20 ($26.26) rise in Universal Credit, which has since expired.

However, the Foundation warns that the withdrawal of the £20 a week uplift to UC in October 2021 is likely to have pushed up poverty in the second year of the pandemic.

Sunak's COVID support packages, which included the £58bn furlough and £20bn self-employment income support schemes – will have helped to cushion the living standards hit to households, says the Foundation. While the £6bn uplift to UC and Tax Credits, the £1bn boost to housing support, and £500m boost to Council Tax Support, will have provided a boost in incomes for poorer households.

As a result, relative poverty (after housing costs) fell two percentage points from 22% to 20%, and absolute poverty declined from 18% to 17%.

Read more: Cost of living crisis: UK shop prices rise at highest rate since 2011

Commenting on the numbers, Adam Corlett, principal economist at the Resolution Foundation, said: "The chancellor’s unprecedented and well-targeted emergency support helped to soften the living standards hit to families, and actually boosted the incomes of the most financially vulnerable.

However, despite this Corlett said "lessons have not been learned" from this "policy success" and called for more support from Sunak as the nation faces a cost of living crisis.

"The lack of targeted support in the recent Spring Statement means that households incomes are set to fall more sharply during the pandemic recovery than they did during the pandemic itself, and over a million extra people are set to fall below the poverty line."

The foundation calculated that the cost of living crisis will push 1.3 million households into absolute poverty, with disposable incomes in the middle quarter to fall 4% next year after housing costs.

For those in the poorest households, income is expected to decline 6%, and for out-of-work households a slump by 8%.

Read more: UK economy grows more than expected but household savings drop

Separate figures released on Thursday showed that UK household savings tumbled to the lowest level since the onset of the pandemic, leaving Brits exposed to soaring energy bills and fuel costs.

Household saving ratios fell to 6.8% in the last three months of 2021 according to new figures from the Office for National Statistics, the tightest since the end of 2019.

The measure, which tracks how much of the typical household’s income is being put into savings products, declined from 7.5% in the previous quarter, having peaked at 23.9% in the early months of COVID.

The figures revealed one in seven families had no savings on the eve of the pandemic, and two in seven had savings of £1,500 or less, both down from a year earlier.

Watch: How to save money on a low income