MORE than 70,000 families have been hit by the two-child limit on child benefits in the first year of the policy, official stats showed yesterday.
Since April 6 2017, only a family’s first two children have been eligible for benefits of up to £2,780 per child per year. Before then all children in low-income families could attract the payment to help keep them out of poverty.
Families with a third or subsequent child born after that date will no longer be able to claim a child element for that child or any future children.
Those who make a new claim for universal credit from February 1 2019, will only receive the child element for two children per family, even if the children were born before April 2017.
Shadow work and pensions secretary Margaret Greenwood called the figures “truly shocking.”
She said: “The two-child limit is an attack on low-income families, is morally wrong and risks pushing children into poverty.
“It cannot be right that the government is making children a target for austerity, treating one child as if they matter less than another.”
Ms Greenwood said Labour will make tackling child poverty the “priority it should be.”
Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) figures show that 2,900 households have received an exception for a third or subsequent child born on or after April 6 2017.
Of these, 2,440 received an exception for multiple births, 270 for a child in non-parental care and 190 for non-consensual conception. To date no households have received the exception for adoption.
Child Poverty Action Group head Alison Garnham said the group’s own analysis suggests that 200,000 children will be pulled into poverty by the two-child limit.
“The DWP statistics now show it’s already having a damaging impact and at a fast pace,” she said.
“These are struggling families, most of them in work, who will lose a huge amount for parents on low pay.
“An estimated one in six UK children will be living in a family affected by the two-child limit once the policy has had its full impact.
“It’s a pernicious, poverty-producing policy.”
