Kedah Menteri Besar Mukhriz Mahathir said increasing the poverty line to spur more rigorous policies to help the poor is better than refusing to acknowledge the problem.

He said this in response to the finding by UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights Philip Alston, who said Malaysia was "severely under-reporting" its poverty numbers due to an unrealistically low poverty line.

He said the government should take its own initiative to increase the poverty line from a monthly income of RM980 per household to RM1,200...