“You could not design a policy better to increase
child poverty than this one”
Government should “immediately abandon” plans to bring in
retrospective effect for the two child limit in three weeks’
time, says the Work and Pensions Select Committee in a
report published today, Friday 11 January 2019. It says applying
the policy retrospectively to children born before the policy was
devised or announced, let alone introduced, entirely undermines
the Government’s assertion that the two-child limit is designed
to influence family planning decisions.
In an urgent interim report, which is intentionally short
and “reveals only the tip of the iceberg”, the
Committee says Government must now consider
all the actual consequences of the two-child limit policy and
whether the ends justify the means. The Committee plans to
look in more detail at the two child limit policy in a wider
inquiry.
In evidence in Parliament the Child Poverty Action Group stated
that “You could not design a policy better to increase child
poverty than this one”. Policy in Practice predicted that
it would lead to 266,000 additional children living in poverty by
the end of this Parliament, representing an increase in child
poverty of more than 10%. A further 256,000 children already
living in poverty would fall further into deprivation.
The Committee says:
- Government must consider whether the very serious consequences
identified in the report are offset by any benefits it believes
the two-child limit policy will deliver.
- The Government should immediately abandon its plans to apply
the two-child limit retrospectively from 1 February 2019, three
weeks from now.
- The Government’s distinction between benefit claimants and
those "supporting themselves in work" is crude and
unrealistic—someone supporting themselves in work today might
well need help from the benefits system tomorrow. This
fundamentally undermines the Government's claim that the
two-child limit is about fairness.
- Further, the planned retrospective application of the policy to
children born before it even existed fundamentally undermines the
Government’s claim that it is about the financial element of
family planning.
Rt Hon MP, Chair of the Committee
said: “What on earth were they thinking? There are
serious concerns about this policy as a whole, but the
retrospective element is simply inexplicable. The Government
claims this policy is about fairness, but it’s hard to think of
anything more unfair than taking money from families whose
children were born before the policy was even thought of. It
cannot be justified on any count and must never see the light of
day.
“This policy is so cruel that I cannot believe the Secretary of
State has knowledge of what is being done in her name. I
hope our report will therefore be read by her and that the
decision to limit benefit to two children retrospectively is
dropped—and quickly. How can it be justified to limit
support to two children when a third or subsequent child is
already born? It would be wicked to push these
children into or further into poverty.”
In 2016, then Secretary of State, Rt Hon said “Our family
stability review found that family instability is one of the main
drivers of poverty, with unstable families more likely to have
low incomes. That is why support for families is firmly at the
heart ofwhat we are doing in Government.” Upon taking
office in November, Rt Hon wrote an open letter describing
her vision for a welfare system that “represents the best of
British values and has women and children at its
heart”. When the policy was announced in 2015 a broad
coalition of religious leaders described it as "fundamentally
anti-family" owing to its likely impact on abortion rates and
family stability. A couple might choose to split up to avoid the
limit, or two people decide against coming together if they have
more than two children between them.
The policy has a particular impact on couples who have
conscientious or religious objections to birth control or
abortion or for whom larger families are a tenet of faith, with
particularly severe implications for certain faith communities.
The Committee also heard that it may breach a litany of human
rights commitments, outlined in the report – including the
fundamental human right to a private family life.
The so-called “rape clause” – an exception that allows a
third or subsequent child to receive benefits if their mother can
“prove” that they were conceived non-consensually or under
coercive control by their father – has been widely criticised.
Apart from the process of “proving” the case for the exception
- DWP were unable to provide the Committee with any
information about the number of applications refused - the
rarity of exceptions to the policy means it is easy for anyone,
including the child themselves, to work out the circumstances of
their conception. Further, the “coercion” exception does not
apply unless mother and children have managed to escape the
abusive relationship: an extremely difficult and dangerous
process. Two women still die every week in England and Wales at
the hands of their current or former partner.
