Rishi Sunak vows to keep the two-child benefit cap in place

Rishi Sunak today confirmed the Tories will retain the two-child benefit cap if they win the general election.

The Prime Minister committed his party to keeping the policy in place as part of his pledge to tackle Britain’s spiralling welfare bill.

The two-child benefit cap prevents parents from claiming universal credit or child tax credit for a third or additional child born after April 2017.

Charities have called for the abolition of the cap and pointed to record levels of child poverty in the UK.

But Mr Sunak, writing in The Sun on Sunday, defended the policy as a matter of ‘fairness’ and said the Tories would keep the cap if they stay in power.

The move will pile pressure on Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, who is facing demands from within his party to remove the limit if he replaces Mr Sunak as PM.

Rishi Sunak confirmed the Tories will retain the two-child benefit cap if they win the general election

The move will pile pressure on Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, who is facing demands from within his party to remove the limit if he replaces Mr Sunak as PM

Mr Sunak recently set out plans to reform the welfare system as he said it was currently letting people down by not being focused enough on the work that claimants might be able to do.

He highlighted how Britain was now spending £69billion per year on benefits for people of working age with a disability or health condition, which is up from £42.3billion in 2019 before the Covid pandemic.

In his newspaper article, Mr Sunak said his approach to welfare was about being ‘fair’ as he confirmed his commitment to the two-child benefit cap.

‘Working families do not see their incomes rise when they have more children,’ he wrote.

‘Families on benefits should be asked to make the same financial decisions as those supporting themselves solely through work.

‘There is nothing compassionate about consigning people who could work to a life trapped on benefits.

‘We will change the system so that we are giving people a hand up rather than a hand-out.’

Responding to Mr Sunak’s article, Child Poverty Action Group chief executive Alison Garnham said: ‘With child poverty at a record high, the PM has now clearly decided that making kids poor is his political priority.

‘After Covid and the cost-of-living crisis, struggling families need a helping hand not another kick in the teeth.

‘The two-child limit makes life harder for kids, punishing them for having brothers and sisters. It’s time to scrap this nasty policy.’

Cherie Blair, who is married to ex-Labour PM Tony Blair, recently blasted the two-child benefit cap by saying it ‘breaks the link between what children need and the support they receive’

Last week saw the launch of a campaign to lift a million children out of poverty by 2030, backed by human rights lawyer Cherie Blair and former children’s commissioner Anne Longfield.

Lady Blair, who is married to former Labour PM Sir Tony Blair, blasted the two-child benefit cap by saying it ‘breaks the link between what children need and the support they receive’.

Her intervention was awkward for Sir Keir, who plans to keep the cap in place if he becomes PM, despite unease among senior Labour politicians including Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham.

Scrapping the two-child benefit cap features among the demands of the Children’s Poverty Plan, a policy supported by the current children’s commissioner Dame Rachel de Souza.

Official statistics published in March showed child poverty hit record highs last year, with 4.33 million children living in households in relative low income in the year to March 2023.

For a couple with two children, this meant a combined weekly income of less than £530 after housing costs.

One in four children are considered to be in absolute poverty, defined as households below 60 per cent of the median income in 2010/11, uprated by inflation, equivalent to less than £485 a week after housing costs for a couple with two children.

The two-child benefit cap was introduced by former chancellor George Osborne, who announced the measure in 2015.

It prevents parents from claiming universal credit or child tax credit for a third or additional child born after April 2017.

Sir Keir himself had previously called for it to be scrapped when he was campaigning to be Labour leader in 2020.

But he has since U-turned and last year said Labour was ‘not changing that policy’ if they were in government after the general election.

It saw the Labour leader suffer a backlash from among his MPs and left-wing supporters.

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