SIR KEIR STARMER still “hasn’t got the message” on Britain’s shocking levels of child poverty, the Usdaw annual conference heard today.
The Labour leader was criticised for failing to commit to scrapping the two-child benefit cap as delegates passed a motion urging the party to make this an “immediate priority.”
In his address to the conference in Blackpool on Tuesday, Sir Keir said general secretary Paddy Lillis had been a “good friend through thick and thin” and vowed to return the favour.
During its welfare and benefits debate today, Plymouth and District General delegate Ryan Aldred drew laughs as he said: “Paddy, Keir hasn’t got the message on this yet, so do us a favour and lob him another text, will you?”
Labour was pilloried by children’s charities for vowing to keep the two-child benefits cap in a policy U-turn last summer.
It prevents parents from claiming universal credit or child tax credit for a third or additional child born after April 2017.
Mr Aldred added: “The hardest hit by this vicious Tory policy are, once again, the most vulnerable and most needy.”
He cited expert studies that 1.5 million children are being affected by the cap, saying: “Removing the cap is widely recognised by economists and think tanks as the most effective way to reduce child poverty.”
Doing so would cost well under £2 billion and take 300,000 children directly out of poverty and a further 800,000 out of “deep poverty,” delegates heard.
“Two billion pounds is a drop in the ocean when you consider the immense wealth that could be unlocked by bringing railways back under public ownership,” he added.
“We are the sixth-richest country in the world, we can easily ensure that no child goes without.”
Mr Lillis said the cap “enshrines into law the discriminatory principle” that some children are more deserving of support than others, adding: “Usdaw will continue to call for the limit to be scrapped.”
Sir Keir’s Usdaw address came ahead of Labour hoping to win the Blackpool South by-election tomorrow after former Tory backbencher Scott Benton quit Parliament while suspended for a lobbying scandal.
He took the seat from Labour with a majority of just under 3,700 in the 2019 election.
The Child Poverty Action Group has said the “deeply harmful” cap leaves some families with just £44 a week after paying rent.
