Influencer Editorial Team
Ministers are actively considering scrapping the two-child benefit cap, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson revealed in an interview with Sky News. Her remarks mark the strongest indication yet that the Labour government may reverse a controversial policy introduced by the Conservatives in 2017.
“It’s not off the table,” Phillipson told presenter Wilfred Frost. “It’s certainly something that we’re considering.”
The cap currently prevents most families from receiving means-tested benefits for more than two children born after April 2017. Labour had faced criticism for retaining the policy despite its roots in Conservative welfare reform.
Recent analysis by the Resolution Foundation suggests that abolishing the cap could lift around 470,000 children out of poverty. Still, Phillipson emphasized the financial challenges the government inherited. “These are not easy or straightforward choices in terms of how we stack it up, but we know the damage child poverty causes,” she said.
As head of the government’s child poverty taskforce, Phillipson noted other ongoing efforts, such as expanding access to free childcare and establishing breakfast clubs. “It is the moral purpose of Labour governments to ensure that everyone, no matter their background, can get on in life,” she added, calling the fight against child poverty her “personal mission.”
According to The Observer, Prime Minister Keir Starmer is said to privately support abolishing the cap and has asked the Treasury to locate the £3.5 billion required to fund the change.
The government’s broader child poverty strategy, initially due this spring, has been delayed. Whether to scrap the two-child limit remains one of the most significant and contentious elements under review.
