One in nine children hit by two-child benefit cap: 'The public will not stomach inaction'

More than 1.6 million children were impacted by the two-child limit on benefits in the year up to April 2025, official statistics have revealed.

New government figures show that there was an increase of 37,150 affected by the policy in comparison to the previous year. It now impacts one in nine children across the UK.

“Many of these are children going for days without a hot meal, sleeping in rooms covered in black mould or going to school in shoes that don’t fit,” said Lynn Perry, chief executive of Barnardo’s.

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A record 4.3 million children are currently living in poverty in the UK, and the two-child benefit cap is believed to be trapping hundreds of thousands of these children in hardship.

The policy blocks families from getting any extra universal credit or child tax credits for their third child and any subsequent children born after April 2017.

Dan Paskins, executive director of policy, advocacy and campaigns at Save the Children UK, said that the government’s new figures are “devastating and shameful in equal measure”.

“No child should be treated as less deserving simply because of when they were born,” Paskins said. “There is no way to reduce child poverty in this parliament without scrapping the two-child limit. 

“The government must do the right thing and abolish the two-child limit, or risk being the first Labour government to oversee a significant rise in child poverty.”

A total of 3,670 women had to declare that they had been a victim of rape in order to gain an exemption from the two-child limit on benefits.

There are some groups of people who are more likely to be impacted. More than half (54%) of all households affected are single parents, whereas single parents represent just 16% of families in the wider population. It also means that women are more likely to be affected.

Alison Garnham, chief executive of the Child Poverty Action Group, said: “The two-child limit pulls over a hundred more kids into poverty every day, making their lives hard and their futures bleak. 

“Giving all kids the best start in life will be impossible until the government scraps this brutal policy – and a year after the election families can’t wait any longer for the help they desperately need.”

Around 40% of households impacted by the two-child limit had at least one adult or child who are in receipt of health or disability benefits – suggesting disabled people are more likely to be affected.

A single parent of four children said: “I can’t work as I am disabled. My children’s father died suddenly so I had to claim benefits for my three children… I don’t get any benefits for my youngest child and it is so hard to budget as little ones grow up quickly and do cost money. Money is tight.”

The two-child limit is also impacting working households – three in five (59%) of families who are affected are working. 

Katie, a 21-year-old from Scotland who lives in a family impacted by the two-child limit said: “It makes me sad that we choose to abandon children, including my siblings, because of something they have no control over.”

The government is set to publish its child poverty strategy in autumn and has promised an “ambitious” strategy to bring down the rates of hardship among children. 

It has promised to address “systemic drivers” of poverty, such as housing and employment, and has set up a child poverty taskforce led by the work and pensions secretary and education secretary which is working with charities to create its strategy.

Lord John Bird, Big Issue founder and crossbench peer, said: “When we hear warnings of children in the 21st century living in Dickensian levels of poverty, we must call this what it is: a poverty crisis. And government policy that creates this crisis cannot be tolerated.

“For any savings the policy makes for the public purse, it will create far more expense for our society now and down the line. Its consequences will be felt in our schools, our NHS, our prisons, and one day, in the same social security system that fails these children.

“It is both a moral and a political necessity that this government ends the two-child benefit cap at the autumn budget. The public will not stomach any more inaction from Labour. They came to power promising an enduring reduction in child poverty and we must have legal targets to hold them to account.”

There are fears that the government will not be able to lift the two-child limit on benefits after it was forced to U-turn on its cuts to disability benefits, meaning it will no longer be making £5bn in savings. Campaigners have suggested there are other ways to generate money, such as a wealth tax.

Joseph Howes, chair of the End Child Poverty Coalition and chief executive of Buttle, said: “No child poverty strategy will succeed in lifting kids out of poverty, if [the two-child limit] remains. We have heard the government say that they are looking at all ‘the available levers’ to reduce child poverty. We all know that this is the lever that needs pulling first – backed up by the government’s own data released today, it’s time for the government to act.”

The government has announced the expansion of free school meals to all children on universal credit and will roll out family hubs to every local authority in the country. 

“But without immediate action, child poverty will simply continue to rise. Hundreds more children will be pulled into poverty with every week this continues,” Perry, of Barnardo’s, added.

 “Ending the policy would lift half a million children out of poverty. The upcoming child poverty strategy is a huge opportunity for the government to change the futures of millions of children, so they have the chance to thrive. When the strategy does arrive, we need to see decisive action.”

A government spokesperson said: “We are determined to give all children the best possible start in life.  Through our Plan for Change, we are reforming the broken social security system to help those who can work, into good well paid jobs- which is the best way to improve living standards for families.

“We are also rolling out a national network of life changing family hubs for children across the country as well as expanding free school meals and supporting 700,000 of the poorest families by introducing a Fair Repayment Rate on Universal Credit deductions.

“The Child Poverty Taskforce will publish an ambitious strategy later this year to ensure we deliver fully funded measures that tackle the structural and root causes of child poverty across the country.”

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