Social Justice Secretary urges Chancellor to remove
two-child limit and benefit cap.
Ahead of a series of meetings in London today with child poverty
charities, Social Justice Secretary has urged the UK
Government to take action to tackle child poverty in its
forthcoming Budget, including immediately scrapping the two-child
limit and the benefit cap.
Ms Somerville has called on the UK Government to fully scrap
the two-child limit on benefits, which pulls 109 children into
poverty every day, while also removing the benefit cap at the
same time, which limits the total amount of benefit a person can
receive.
Subject to parliamentary approval, the Scottish Government plans
to mitigate the two-child limit from March next year, through a
new Two-Child Limit Payment worth £292.81 a month for eligible
recipients. Estimates show this will keep 20,000 children out of
relative poverty next year. The Scottish Government is
spending £100 million this financial year, through the
Discretionary Housing Payment scheme, to mitigate the benefits
cap as far as possible within devolved powers.
Ms Somerville said:
“Once again, I am making it clear that the UK Government must
fully scrap the two-child limit and the benefit cap as soon as
possible. These policies should be confined to the darkest days
of austerity and the UK Budget must bring this period to an end.
“In a country as rich as ours, no child should have to live in
poverty. The UK social security system is supposed to be there to
ensure a basic standard of living, reduce poverty and inequality
and help people through the toughest of times.
“That is why the Scottish Government has made bold decisions
- like introducing the Scottish Child Payment and investing in
our devolved social security system. Child poverty rates are
now lower in Scotland than the rest of the UK and relative child
poverty rates in Scotland are at their lowest level in almost a
decade.
“I call on the Chancellor to follow our example by scrapping the
caps, match the Scottish Child Payment and introduce an
essentials guarantee, which would ensure Universal Credit
actually covers the costs of life's essentials, such as food and
fuel.”
Background
The Social Justice Secretary is holding a series of meetings
with anti-poverty charities and academics in London today (Friday
14 November) to discuss levers to tackle child poverty.
The Cabinet Secretary had hoped to meet her UK Government
counterpart, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, , inviting him to meet with her in London. This
follows correspondence of 11 September and 3 October focused on
the UK Government's Child Poverty Strategy and seeking clarity on
UK Government plans in relation to the two-child limit. No
response has been received.
Scottish Government modelling estimates that if the UK Government
introduced an essentials guarantee while matching the Scottish
Child Payment and scrapping the two-child limit and benefit cap,
it would lift 100,000 children in Scotland out of poverty this
year: Child poverty modelling:
update - gov.scot
Relative and absolute poverty rates can be found here: Child poverty summary
For UK child poverty rate comparisons, please see table 2.2 in
the following report: Section 2 - Assessing
progress against the targets - Tackling Child Poverty Delivery
Plan: progress…
