The areas worst hit by the two-child benefit cap are safe Labour constituencies – a finding set to heap pressure on Sir Keir Starmer to reverse his backing for the policy.
The top five constituencies with the highest numbers of children adversely affected by the cap – shown to have a strong correlation to child poverty – were held by Labour at the 2019 election and likely to be retained by the party on Thursday.
According to analysis by Loughborough University and the End Child Poverty Coalition (ECPC), among them are the constituencies where senior shadow cabinet members David Lammy and Jess Phillips are seeking re-election.
Labour has been under sustained pressure to commit to abolishing the cap, but Starmer has said he will keep it in place, albeit reluctantly, citing the need for fiscal prudence.
In his latest comments on the issue during an interview on ITV News last week, the Labour leader said he “understands” the damage done by the policy, but would not commit to something that “on the current state of the economy, I don’t think we can properly afford”.
The cap, introduced by George Osborne in 2017, restricts universal credit and child tax credit to a family’s first two children. It affects an estimated two million children in the UK – about one in 10 – and leaves low-income families £3,200 a year worse off for each additional child over the limit.
It was brought in to reduce public spending and encourage families to make decisions based on their financial circumstances, but has been roundly criticised for penalising larger families and worsening child poverty rates.
Research has underscored the policy’s role as a key driver in pushing families into poverty, and Loughborough University and the ECPC say their findings reveal a “strong positive correlation between child poverty and the two-child limit” in constituencies across the UK.
Data shared with i shows 28 per cent of children – the highest level in the UK – in Diane Abbott’s Hackney North and Stoke Newington constituency, and Graham Stringer’s Blackley and Middleton South constituency, are affected by the two-child limit.
Both constituencies have comparatively high levels of child poverty, at 40 per cent in Ms Abbott’s seat and 51 per cent in Mr Stringer’s.
Other notable hotspots include shadow justice secretary Shabana Mahmood’s constituency of Birmingham Ladywood, where 25 per cent of children are affected by the cap; Jess Phillips’s Birmingham Yardley seat with 24 per cent; and shadow foreign secretary David Lammy’s Tottenham seat, with 21 per cent.
i sought comment from all parliamentary candidates implicated in the findings, but either did not receive a response or was directed to Labour HQ.
Ms Abbott is among those who have called for the policy to be scrapped, claiming the move was “easily affordable”.
Other senior Labour figures to have criticised the cap and called for its removal include deputy leader Angela Rayner, who called it “cruel and inhumane”, and shadow work and pensions secretary Jonathan Ashworth, who described it as “heinous” and responsible for “pushing children and families into poverty”.
Former Labour prime minister, Gordon Brown, has been vehement in his condemnation. In May, he lashed out at the policy’s “inequities”, arguing it was “condemning children to poverty” and should be abolished before the general election.
Approached for comment, Labour pointed to lines in the party’s manifesto such as: “Labour will develop an ambitious strategy to reduce child poverty”. This would allegedly be achieved by working with the voluntary sector, faith organisations, trade unions, business, devolved and local government, and communities.
The document pledges to review universal credit. But there is no mention of the two-child limit.
Joseph Howes, chair of the ECPC, called the cap “cruel” and said any party “serious about tackling child poverty” should get rid of it.
Scrapping the policy, at a cost of £1.8bn a year, is estimated to lift 300,000 children out of poverty and reduce the depth of deprivation experienced by a further 800,000, according to calculations by the ECPC.
‘It’s stressful having to count every single penny’
For Emma Salmon, a part-time nursery school teacher living in Chingford, east London with her three children, balancing finances is a challenge.
“I struggle with paying for food and clothing,” Ms Salmon, 37, says. “The two-child limit really impacts me. I end up borrowing money off family to pay for basics, so then that comes straight out of my universal credit again to give it back. It’s just a never-ending cycle.
“I have to make decisions about what the kids can or can’t have, especially with food. I try and do weekly shops but towards the next benefit payment, I’ll just use up what we’ve got. So that will be stuff in the freezer, or often they’ll have things out of tins for dinner. I try and keep my middle one in the school club a little bit longer so he can have tea there to save money.
“My children eat quite a lot of fruit and vegetables, but by the end of the week it’s gone and I can’t go and buy more, so sometimes they do eat more junk food towards the end of the week because it’s cheaper. I know that sounds terrible, but to buy a packet of biscuits for 50p is a lot cheaper than a punnet of strawberries for £2.50.”
Almost half of those affected by the two-child limit are single parents like Ms Salmon. And most of the families have parents that are in work. Ms Salmon earns £12,000 a year as an early years practitioner – but with the sole responsibility of three children and excluded from other benefits such as free school meals (for those earning £7,400 or less) – she constantly struggles to make ends meet.
“I’ve really noticed the difference between having two on my own, to having three on my own,” she says. “Financially, it’s a huge difference. You can’t have luxuries – like if I wanted to take the children to the trampolining park or swimming, that’s something I would have to save for.”
The relentless struggle to get by takes a toll on her. “I try and not let it show to them but it’s really stressful because I have to count every single penny.”
If the cap was scrapped, with more than £3,000 extra in her bank each year, Ms Salmon says she’d feel “a hell of a lot less stressed”. “It means that if any of them needed something, I could just get it,” she says. “I don’t mean luxuries, I mean essentials. My daughter needs new underwear at the moment but I have to wait until I get paid.”
Earlier this year, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) warned that 250,000 more children will be hit by the cap in the next year alone – 670,000 more by the end of the next parliament.
More children are added each year because the policy applies to all those born after 5 April 2017. The IFS said once fully rolled out, the policy will affect one in five children.
Research by the ECPC found that 50 per cent of those affected are single-parent families and 20 per cent have at least one disabled child. And the majority – 81 per cent – have at least one working parent.
The UK has been blighted by persistently high levels of child poverty for decades – between 2014 and 2021 the nation experienced the largest increase in relative child poverty of any advanced economy, according to Unicef, the UN children’s organisation. According to the ECPC, 4.3 million children in the UK (about 30 per cent of all children) now live in poverty.
Since 2017, when the cap was introduced, the number of children experiencing deprivation has almost tripled – an increase of 186 per cent – according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. The poverty rate for families with three or more children is almost double that for one or two-child families.
The Liberal Democrats and Green Party have both committed to abolishing the limit in their manifestos.
Rishi Sunak has asserted that he would keep the cap in place. The Conservative manifesto references the limit as part of the party’s work to create a welfare “system fairer to the taypayers who pay for it” and ensure benefits are a “safety net, not a lifestyle choice”.
Joseph Howes, chief executive of Buttle UK and chair of the End Child Poverty Coalition, said: “The two-child limit is a cruel policy, which pushes families into poverty. Any political party that is serious about tackling child poverty must immediately scrap this and lift 300,000 children out of poverty.
“We cannot condemn another generation of children to living in low-income families – the time to act is now.”