Children were pawns, says minister ahead of first vote to scrap two-child limit

The two-child benefit limit was a policy which used children as pawns, MPs heard as they debated ahead of a first vote on proposals to scrap the cap.

Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden told the UK Parliament the policy – introduced under the Conservatives in 2017 – was “all about the politics of dividing lines” between the “deserving and undeserving poor”.

Labour has faced calls to scrap the policy, which restricts child tax credit and universal credit to the first two children in most households, since they came to power in summer 2024.

Seven Labour MPs were suspended by the party after a backing an SNP motion to scrap the welfare measure in a vote in Parliament that year.

The UK Government had at the time cited spending controls as a reason for not being able to ditch the policy immediately, indicating there would be no change without economic growth.

But following repeated calls from charities, campaigners and many of the party’s own MPs, Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced in the autumn budget last year that the Government would move to scrap the policy from April.

Addressing the Commons on Tuesday for the second reading of the Universal Credit (Removal of Two Child Limit) Bill on Tuesday, Mr McFadden said: “It (the policy) was never really about welfare reform, nor was it even about saving money.

“No, this was always first and foremost a political exercise, an attempt to set a trap for opponents, with children used as the pawns in the exercise.

“This was all about the politics of dividing lines, dividing lines between so-called shirkers and strivers, between the old distinction of the deserving and undeserving poor.

“Politics first and policy second every time.”

The Conservatives have said they will be voting against the Bill but given Labour’s majority in the Commons, it is expected the legislation will pass second reading when voted on later on Tuesday.

Tory former minister Sir Desmond Swayne suggested scrapping the policy was more about saving Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, referring to an alleged codename given to a plan to save Boris Johnson’s leadership during his time in No 10.

He asked Mr McFadden: “What has changed? It’s not the fiscal situation. It’s not any room in the benefits budget.

“This is about, this is the Labour equivalent of Project Save Big Dog, isn’t it?”

But Mr McFadden said Labour’s first job when the party took office had been to “stabilise the economy after the irresponsibility and chaos of the Tory years”.

He said Ms Reeves, who sat behind him during the debate, had set out how scrapping the policy “can only be done now and can only be funded through a combination of savings from fraud and error in the benefit system, changes to the Motability scheme and reform of online gambling taxation”.

Around 400,000 fewer children will be living in poverty this April compared with 12 months earlier as a result of the change, according to analysis by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF).

Children’s doctors, teachers, health visitors and anti-poverty charities have called on MPs to vote in support of ending the policy.

A statement issued on behalf of 63 organisations, including the Child Poverty Action Group, Citizens Advice, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, and teaching union the NASUWT branded the cap “an awful experiment that hurt children” and said this vote “marks the moment when we start to turn things around for the next generation”.

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) said the move will cost £3 billion a year by 2029/30.

Conservative former deputy prime minister Sir Oliver Dowden, defending the policy, told the Commons: “There was a principle behind this, which is, will people take responsibility for their own actions?

“Because there are thousands, millions of people who choose not to have more children because they want to take responsibility for their lives and they don’t want the state to take responsibility, and yet now with this change, the Government is saying to those people, not only will the state take responsibility, you as the individual will have to pay for it through higher taxes.”

If it passes Tuesday’s vote, the Bill will be further scrutinised by MPs and peers before it can become law.

The UK Government has said that scrapping the two-child limit alongside other measures in its wider strategy to tackle child poverty will lift 550,000 children out of poverty by 2030, which it hailed as the biggest reduction in a single parliament since records began.