Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alison McGovern and Joshua Reynolds

Monday 17th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Joshua Reynolds (Maidenhead) (LD)]

3. What assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of removing the two-child benefit cap.

[The Minister for Employment (Alison McGovern)]

The two-child benefit cap was introduced by the Conservative party 10 years ago. Its period in office saw child poverty rise to over 4 million and one in three of our children arriving at primary school not ready to learn. As soon as the Secretary of State and I were appointed, we got to work to establish our child poverty taskforce, as promised in Labour’s manifesto, and those efforts are ongoing.

[Mr Joshua Reynolds]

A BMJ study found that people in food poverty have diets with worse health outcomes including more fat, sugar and salt, so what conversations has the Minister had with the Health Secretary about how lifting the two-child benefit cap could improve diet and reduce costs for the NHS?

[Alison McGovern]

The Health Secretary and I talked about child poverty many times as we sat on the Opposition Benches watching the situation for our kids get worse and worse every year. The Member makes a very serious and important point about the wide-ranging consequences of poverty and, if I may, I would encourage him to submit the evidence he mentioned to the child poverty taskforce so that we can take full account of it.