THE new Labour government must match the Scottish Child Payment across Britain to fight poverty, the SNP demanded today.

A BBC investigation compared the plight of families living with poverty north and south of the border, concluding the two-child cap “affects families across the UK, but the impact of the policy has been somewhat reduced in Scotland due to the Scottish Child Payment."

The SNP seized on the report to call for the £26.70 per child payment, estimated to have kept 100,000 children in Scotland out of poverty, to be rolled out UK-wide.

SNP social justice and equality spokeswoman Kirsty Blackman said: “That would make a major difference to families in Scotland and across the UK, lifting thousands out of poverty.

“With every day the UK government delays action, it pushes more children into poverty.

“Politics is about priorities and there is no greater, or more urgent, priority than eradicating child poverty.”

The call comes following the failure last week of all but seven Labour MPs to back the SNP’s Commons call to scrap the two-child cap on benefits and its attendant “rape clause.”