NEW Labour’s prominent figures are clashing over plans to eliminate the two-child benefit cap, amidst statistics indicating an increase in the number of children falling into poverty.
In a bombshell intervention, ex-Home Secretary David Blunkett today comes out against tearing up the welfare limit.
It puts him at loggerheads with former PM Gordon Brown, who branded the benefit cap cruel and is leading the charge to abolish it.
Lord Blunkett’s explosive comments come as Sir Keir Starmer is under huge pressure over the policy.
Around 4.5 million children were living in relative poverty last year, a rise from 4.3 million the previous year, according to data from the End Child Poverty coalition.
Furious Labour MPs are in open revolt over the two-child cap — which they want scrapped.
Imposed in 2017, it stops parents claiming child tax credit or universal credit worth up to £3,455 per year for more than two children.
Reform leader Nigel Farage fanned the flames last week by vowing to ditch it if he becomes PM.
Downing Street accused him of “fantasy economics” and said his £3.5billion spending pledge was unfunded.
But amid bitter rows inside the Government about it, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has said axing the cap is “on the table”.
Writing in today’s The Sun on Sunday, Lord Blunkett said work, not handouts, is the best way to raise families out of poverty.
He said: “Surely having children that you cannot afford to feed is the legacy of a bygone era?
“The simple and obvious truth is that child poverty springs from the lack of income of the adults who care for them.”
A decision on the cap is set for the autumn — with Chancellor Rachel Reeves expected to announce tax rises to pay for it if it is axed.
Privately, Government figures believe the clear direction of travel is that it will be lifted.
Compounding the pressure on No 10, exclusive figures provided to The Sun on Sunday reveal a sharp increase in the number of impoverished children within Sir Keir’s own constituency.
Holborn and St Pancras in London had a rate of 47 per cent last year compared with 36.3 per cent the year before, the End Child Poverty coalition found.
The group defines child poverty to be growing up in a household where income is 60 per cent below average.
For a family of one adult and one child this is £263 a week and for a family of two adults and two children it is £547 a week.
A slew of Labour Cabinet ministers represent seats with high levels of child poverty, the research found.
Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood’s Birmingham Ladywood seat had the highest, at 61.9 per cent.
Rachel Reeves represents a constituency where one in three kids are in poverty while Deputy PM Angela Rayner’s seat has almost 40 per cent.
The PM has promised to cut child poverty by the 2029 election.
Axing the cap will cost about £3.5billion and would have to be funded by tax rises or even deeper cuts.
Ditching it and a full U-turn on the winter fuel allowance would together cost £5billion.
It is the same amount No 10 is trying to save with its cuts to disability and sickness benefits — being voted on later this month.
Around 180,000 households not in work would get more cash, it said. While just 270,000 households in work — but on low wages — would benefit.
Lord Blunkett, while backing the cap, supports lifting it for parents who have disabled kids or multiple births — such as twins or triplets.
The peer, who was brought up in grinding poverty in Sheffield, also called on the Government to “come down like a ton of bricks” on absent fathers who do not pay for their kids.
Tomorrow, more than 130 charities will call on Labour to axe the two-child policy in full.
Dan Paskins, of Save the Children, said: “A record number of children are now in poverty and this is under the noses of our MPs, particularly Cabinet members.”
A Government spokeswoman said: “We’ve already expanded free breakfast clubs, introduced a cap on cost of school uniforms, increased the national minimum wage for the lowest incomes, uprated benefits in April and supported 700,000 of the poorest families by introducing a Fair Repayment Rate on Universal Credit deductions.”
