Oral Answers to Questions

David Linden Excerpts

Monday 4th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

The Minister seems to forget that the two-child limit impacts people who are on in-work benefits. The only exemption to the two-child limit is if a woman can prove that her third or a subsequent child has been born as a result of rape. How many people has the Minister’s Department asked to prove that they have been raped in order to get an exemption to the two-child limit?

[Guy Opperman]

We do not use the language used by the hon. Gentleman, but I will of course write to him.

[David Linden]

I am disappointed that the Minister does not know, because his Department has made 2,590 women prove and relive the ordeal of being raped, simply to get that state support, but given that the Labour party and the Conservatives support the two-child policy and rape clause, does it give him comfort to know that when the “Ghost of George Osborne Future” comes into office, his legacy in promoting astronomical child poverty rates will be safe in the hands of the Blairites on the Labour Benches?

[Guy Opperman]

I can only repeat that, compared with 2009-10, there are 400,000 fewer children in absolute poverty after housing costs.