Rachel Reeves can’t build a fair economy on hungry children
The only way the Government will reduce child poverty is to scrap the two-child benefit cap, writes Alison Garnham.
As the budget gets closer and debate about what the country can afford gets ever louder, it’s easy for the voices and interests of the 4.5 million children living in poverty to be drowned out.
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But with the Government’s long-awaited child poverty strategy delayed to coincide with the budget, families up and down the country are desperate for it to contain action to improve their living standards.
The Government has a popular commitment – first made in its manifesto and repeated many times since – to reduce child poverty in this parliament. And the best, in fact, the only way for them to do that is to abolish the two-child limit.
The two-child limit is an austerity-era policy that is still being rolled out, and pulls an additional 109 kids into poverty every single day, joining the 1.6 million children in families already affected by it. The majority of these children live in working families with three kids. Their parents are taxpayers, and the children aren’t responsible for the country’s economic woes even though it seems like they’re being asked to pay the price for them.
Despite the Government’s strong commitment to reduce child poverty, alternatives to scrapping the two-child limit have been mooted. But scrapping the two-child limit in full is the most cost-effective way to reduce the number of children living in poverty, pound for pound. So when the chancellor is facing difficult decisions, it doesn’t make sense to implement a less efficient half-measure. In fact doing so will just cost the taxpayer more over time anyway, as the cost of child poverty to public services is estimated to be almost £40 billion every year.
And replacing the policy with some other limit on the support that children can receive will almost certainly mean that children in deeper poverty would receive less support and be left further behind. That’s not a steady or credible first step towards government delivering on its promise to the nation’s children.
The Government wants to give all children the best start in life. But the reality is that here in the UK, children are going hungry and living in cold homes. Child poverty – now at a record high - means worse physical and mental health, poorer educational outcomes, and even shorter life expectancy.
This budget is a crucial moment for government to lay the foundations for future generations. And if the question is can we afford measures to reduce child poverty, the answer is surely that we can’t afford not to.
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Alison Garnham is the Chief Executive of Child Poverty Action Group.
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