Universal Credit (Removal of Two Child Limit) Bill

Debate between Baroness Sherlock and Lord Bird

2nd reading & Committee negatived & 3rd reading
Thursday 12th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

My Lords, I am so grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to this debate. I love listening to maiden speeches, when we get an insight into the range and depth of experience coming into this House. Today we heard three magnificent examples. If anyone outside is listening, that exceptional richness of experience is what this House can bring to debates. We have heard about defence and air power; conflict and resolving conflict; climbing mountains, both literal and metaphorical; the importance of business; the compelling relational power of tea in the Long Room and learning to play dominoes—I may be better at one of those than the other, but maybe time will tell. I thank all noble Lords so much for coming in and contributing.

In developing our child poverty strategy, we engaged extensively with all kinds of people, including families, campaigners and experts. The aim was to try to work out what would have the greatest impact on the day-to-day lives of children living in poverty. The message was really clear: remove the two-child limit. I am grateful to my noble friend Lady Shah for pointing out the challenges we inherited and why it takes time for Governments to work through dealing with everything that comes out.

The Bill is supported by over 60 organisations, representing anti-poverty charities, which is perhaps not surprising, but also children’s doctors, teachers and health visitors—the people who know only too well the damaging effects of poverty and see its consequences every day. I remain very grateful for the work of the campaigning organisations, those professionals who support our children and all those who pushed for this change, including the Bishops’ Bench. I share the remembrance of the former right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham, who pushed for this in his time in this House.

The Bill is an investment to deliver a better future for children and for our country. Many noble Lords, including the noble Baroness, Lady Teather, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Leicester, have set out the devastating impact that poverty has on children. Many, including my noble friend Lord Babudu, have pointed out that poverty is not evenly distributed.

Poverty imposes really significant costs on individuals and the country. Let me start with the Official Opposition, because they have set out clearly why they oppose this. It is my experience, in many years in and around politics, that, if you want to defend the indefensible, the first thing you do is set up some clearly false dichotomies. What have we listened to today? “It is children versus defence”. Of course it is not. If I were going to play politics, I would point out that, if the Conservatives felt that passionately about it when they were in government, maybe they should not have cut £12 billion from defence spending in their first term alone; maybe they should not have cut spending from the 2.5% the last Labour Government left, pushing us to raise it to 2.6% by next year; maybe they should have slashed child poverty. They were not choosing between the two things: they attacked both of them. Now, we could have that kind of conversation, or we could have a different kind of conversation. Let us take a step back and look at what actually happens with the policies.

What is the other false dichotomy? I think we fall into making a mistake if we try to set up social security versus work. I am not repeating the figure that 59% of families hit by the two-child limit are in work, in order to make a political point; I am pointing out that our social security system is there to help people in and out of work, and to help them get from being out of work into being in work. If the barriers get in the way of people being able to move into work, the system is not doing its job. Every time we start trying to pretend that this is contrasting people lying in bed all day with the blinds shut with those who go out to work, we do everyone a disservice. Please let us not have that conversation.

What we want to do is recognise that we have to enable work, encourage work and take away the barriers to work—that is really important—and that neither those in nor out of work are static populations: people move between those states, for a whole range of reasons. Our job is to make sure that, for those who can work, they stay in work as much as they can, for as long as they can, and, if they come out, to help them back into it when they can—but, if they cannot, to support them, because that is what we do by pooling risk.

The noble Lord, Lord Redwood, made some very interesting points. I parted company with him when he got to a certain point in his speech, but he made a really interesting point in saying that this policy is clearly not a panacea. The state cannot and should not pretend that it can solve all the problems families have, and the state does not raise children: families do.

The starting point, however, is that, if we want to tackle child poverty, as the noble Viscount, Lord Younger, said he does, the first thing we have to do is stop making it worse: stop tipping more children into poverty every year. The second step is to work out what the barriers are to people moving into work and developing in their lives. The noble Lord, Lord Redwood, mentioned some of those that are nothing to do with money, and the state can only do what it can to try to make it as easy as possible for families to do the right thing: investing in relationships education, supporting families —all kinds of education—and communities and relationships. What the state can do is tackle the things it can do something about. It is definitely not all about money, but it is not not about money: the statistics show really clearly, for example, the impact of poverty on family breakup and on parents struggling to do the right thing by their kids. We need to do both.

The next thing we need to do is create opportunities. I always hate disagreeing with the noble Lord, Lord Bird, because I know that he will come back at me, rightly, but we have to start to move not away from but beyond “handout versus hand up”. I absolutely agree with him that our job is to give people a hand up. He has done that in his time—as, indeed, has the noble Baroness, Lady Stedman-Scott—but I would not contrast that with any support the state gives to those who are struggling when they need it. A lot of what we do is on both those things. Like my noble friend Lord Walker, I have a real interest in how we use my department to help those who are struggling to get into work. Just this week, I was at a conference talking to businesses that are helping ex-offenders into work.

[Lord Bird (CB)]

My Lords—

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

I knew I should not have mentioned him.

[Lord Bird (CB)]

Is it not wonderful that social security can be used as a hand up? That is the point I am trying to make. I am not trying to make the point of work versus social security. I am saying that a hand up is absolutely marvellous. The greatest hand up that I got was a probation officer.

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

Indeed, and that probation officer clearly did a very good job: look where the noble Lord has ended up. Would that they were all that successful. I suppose that that is quite a high bar at which to set them, but I commend it. That is a really great point, and I am now violently agreeing with the noble Lord; but I will move on.

I want the social security system to do its job, and for most people its job is to support them into work, and in work, and to develop them in work. That is very much what this Government are seeking to do.

One of the challenges with universal credit is about assumptions. It was designed to move people into and out of work—to work in and out of work—and when it works it does so very well. All we are doing is making sure that the system works even better than it does. But the assumption that this Government are doing the wrong thing by spending money on tackling child poverty is fundamentally mistaken. My noble friend Lord Walker talked about the need to make sure we tackle NEETs, for example. We have one in eight of our young people not in employment, education or training. They did not start at 16.

Household Support Fund

Debate between Baroness Sherlock and Lord Bird

Wednesday 24th July 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

I am grateful; that is a really important point and I thank the noble Baroness for making it. Prevention is always better than cure, even if it is not always possible to replace cures entirely with prevention. There may always be the need for some support locally. The way that the fund runs has been designed deliberately so that every local authority can choose how it spends it; and they have chosen to do it in different ways. DWP has given guidance about the nature of the groups that need supporting, and it is for essential support. Some authorities have given grants to third parties; others have given money directly to people and some have even given food. But her broader point is well made. I certainly know that my colleagues in the Ministry for local government—MHCLG—are talking closely with local authorities about how we can get better at doing multiyear funding, giving stability to local government and engaging more effectively in the way that we spend this money.

[Lord Bird (CB)]

While we are talking about poverty and children, can I ask a very cheeky question? Why is it that the Government are punishing seven members of the Labour Party who have put the party behind the interests of the people? Why are they doing this? This is a very disgraceful thing to be doing so early in their Administration.

Child Poverty

Debate between Baroness Sherlock and Lord Bird

Monday 29th April 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for securing this debate and all noble Lords who have spoken. Before I say anything more, I add my reflection to those of my noble friend Lady Lister and the noble Baroness, Lady Bottomley, in memory of Lord Field. He was an example to all of us of what it means to take a whole lifetime and yet, at the end, never cease to be outraged by the level of child poverty in a rich country. We all owe him a debt.

Tonight’s debate has highlighted the multifaceted nature of poverty. Whenever we have debates on poverty, there is always a temptation for some people to say that it is not about money and other people to say that it is only about money. Manifestly neither is correct. It is not just about money but it is not not about money either. The noble Baroness, Lady Janke, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Lincoln and other noble Lords made a very clear point of explaining what happens when you simply do not have enough money. If that is the case, all the strategies and all the preventive work in the world does not help you feed your kids that night; you simply cannot afford to do it.

On the basic level of access to resources, Britain is not in a good place. Over a fifth of our population lives in relative poverty. I know that the Government prefer absolute poverty as a measure, probably because it normally falls as real incomes rise, but, in the latest statistics in the document Households Below Average Income, we learned that the share of people living in absolute poverty is going up again, as the noble Baroness, Lady Janke, pointed out. There are 600,000 more people, half of them children, living in absolute poverty, in what is still one of the richest countries in the world by global standards. We should not be in this space.

Look at how this cashes out. The IFS has been pointing out that the number in material deprivation rose by 3 million in the three years to last year. In that same time, the proportion of those who could not adequately heat their homes jumped from just 4% to 11%. I must say to the Minister that, although the Government chose to give people cost of living support, they gave the same amount of money to everybody, whether a single person living in a studio flat or somebody with a family living in a larger house. As a result, the official statistics said:

“Incomes for those with children reduced the most. This reflects the flat nature of the cost of living and additional support payments, meaning for larger households they are split between more household members”.


Have the Government reflected on the best way to support people in these circumstances?

I fully accept that it is about not just incomes but support and opportunity. But child poverty has combined with the impact of 14 years of public service neglect, frankly, and the differential impacts of the pandemic to produce an attainment gap between children who experienced deprivation and their peers, with a lifelong impact on their life chances.

What should happen now? The last Labour Government lifted 2 million children and pensioners out of poverty. I know the noble Lord, Lord Bird, said at the start that he thinks, essentially, “A plague on all your houses. None of you has done anything”, but I am proud that the last Labour Government introduced Sure Start. As the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, pointed out, not only did it have an effect at the time but children had better GCSEs later as a result of having been part of Sure Start back then. I had a privilege of being part of the Treasury team working with Gordon Brown on questions of poverty when Sure Start was being introduced.

[Lord Bird (CB)]

I just want to say that I used Sure Start. In spite of appearances, I was a very young father, and it was the most wonderful thing. I lived on the largest housing estate in south London and Sure Start was absolutely brilliant, so I am 100% behind it.

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for clarifying that. One of the most depressing points of my career, frankly, was coming into the Lords in 2010 and having to sit on the Opposition Benches watching everything that I had worked on introducing being dismantled stage by stage in the name of austerity. However, we are where we are.

What should happen now? If the British people were to trust Labour again in an election—and obviously I hope they will—then we would want to introduce a mission-driven Government, and one of our five key missions would be to break down the barriers to opportunity for every child at every stage, with a strategy to tackle child poverty. It would be the responsibility of all government departments to tackle the fundamental drivers of poverty. We would address that by having cross-departmental mission boards looking at exactly how that was being driven across departments.

We would focus on increasing the number of young people in education, employment or training. We would look to reform childcare and early years support, introduce free breakfast clubs, and improve school standards. I agree with the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, about the importance of the nutritional content of school food and of access to sports.

On financial education, I am split. I agree with the noble Earl about the importance of financial education. However, recently I have met people who work for charities that traditionally have given debt advice. They told me in the past they would bring people in, sit them down, look at all the sources of income and all their outgoings, and help them to manage their budgets. They are now saying that more and more—sometimes most—of the people they come across literally do not have enough money to do it. Their budgets cannot be balanced; even the charity workers cannot balance them, with all their skills in financial education and management. So we have something of a crisis here. We need people who can manage to be taught how to manage well, while those who simply cannot manage it, however good they are, need to be helped to find a way through that. We would therefore want to support our social security system, strengthen rights to representation at work, improve social security and extend sick pay. We would boost wages by removing the minimum wage bands and expanding the remit of the Low Pay Commission.

We would want to tackle the housing crisis by retrofitting homes, strengthening renters’ rights and building more social and affordable housing. I take the underlying point that the noble Lord, Lord Bird, is making: decent, affordable and safe housing is a necessary but not sufficient condition to enable people to move out of poverty. It is both of those things. It is necessary because many of the people who would not be in social housing would otherwise be in bed and breakfasts, insecurely housed or, even worse, out on the streets.

We need nothing short of national renewal in this country. It will not happen overnight and will not be easy, but it should surely be the priority of any Government to guarantee opportunity to all our children. That is something I think we can all get behind.