Angela Rayner defends decision not to scrap two-child benefit cap

Angela Rayner has recognised that families are “frustrated” at Labour’s refusal to scrap the two-child benefit cap as she defended her party’s position. 

It comes as the government faces growing pressure from across the political spectrum to get rid of the cap, with Labour readying for a potential rebellion in the House of Commons on the issue.

Speaking on Tuesday morning, deputy prime minister Rayner said Labour’s economic inheritance from the Conservatives was “dire” and “we can’t do everything”.

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Asked why Labour will not lift the cap, the housing and communities secretary told the BBC: “We are going to be reviewing Universal Credit and I think that is important. Secondly, we have got a child poverty strategy, which, it is not just one lever.

“I accept that people are frustrated around the two-child cap… they are frustrated over 14 years, we have had 14 years of the Tories who have put us on the highest tax burden for 70 years and the lowest growth.

“That is why growth is imperative to us so we can afford to spend on making sure we can lift children out of poverty.”

Rayner insisted that Labour had made clear during the election campaign that “if we cannot say where the money is coming from we will not make unfunded spending commitments” and the party is “not going to change course now”.

Stephen Flynn, the SNP’s Westminster leader, has said his party will table an amendment to the King’s Speech to end the cap.

The amendment has little chance of passing, but Flynn wrote to Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar on Monday, calling on him to direct the party’s Scottish MPs to potentially vote against the government.

The House of Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle holds the power to select amendments.

Flynn said the two-child cap is “pushing thousands of Scottish children into poverty” and ending it is “the bare minimum” required of the new government.

In the letter, Flynn said it would be “simple” for the government to scrap the cap “immediately”, adding this was “a political choice and it requires politicians, across parties, to demand better”.

The Labour leadership has also who faced pressure from senior party figures to row back on its position over the policy.

Former shadow chancellor John McDonnell has joined the left-wing grassroots organisation Momentum in urging the government to ditch the policy.

Meanwhile, the Liberal Democrats said they would scrap the policy in their manifesto.

Even some Conservatives have disowned the policy, including the right-wing former home secretary MP Suella Braverman.

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage is another to have spoken out against the cap.

The policy came into effect in April 2017, having been announced by George Osborne during his time as chancellor in 2015. It prevents parents claiming universal credit for any third or subsequent child.

It is said that scrapping the cap would lift about 270,000 households with children out of poverty at an estimated cost of £1.4 billion in the first year.

Keir Starmer, the Labour leader, has previously said he would scrap the two-child limit “in an ideal world”.

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