Universal Credit (Removal of Two Child Limit) Bill

Jeevun Sandher Excerpts

2nd reading & Money resolution
Tuesday 3rd February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dr Jeevun Sandher (Loughborough) (Lab)]

Madam Deputy Speaker, it is a pleasure to be able to speak for the next hour, while there is no time limit. [Laughter.] Buckle in!

I want to start today’s speech by first addressing what the Conservatives said and why we need state support to help end child poverty in the technological era we are in. I also want to make clear why we are ending the two-child limit. In the economic sense, yes, it is a pounds and pence issue—we save more money by feeding kids today—but far more importantly, morally no child in this country should be going hungry.

Before I get to that, I would like to share with the House where I spent two years of my life between 2016 and 2018, when I was the economist working in Somaliland’s Ministry of Finance. I was there during what was then its worst drought in living memory. When drought came to Somaliland—one of the poorest nations on earth—it meant failing harvests, dying livestock and rising hunger. I will never forget what that hunger looked like and what it felt like for a whole nation.

I could understand what was happening in Somaliland, even if it was incredibly difficult, but I was shocked and appalled on returning to this country to see children going hungry here—in the fifth richest nation on earth. Those children went hungry after the introduction of the two-child limit. Poverty went up in the largest families, who were affected by the two-child limit, and child hunger went up. Food bank parcels were unknown in my childhood; there were a million handed out in 2017, and three million by the time the Conservatives left office. Most shamefully of all, child malnutrition has doubled over the past decade. That is the shameful legacy of the two-child limit and what it meant for child hunger in this country.

[Rebecca Smith (South West Devon) (Con)]

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Trussell Trust was founded in this country in 2000, under a Labour Government, and that the Department for Work and Pensions did not recommend that it be offered as a solution to families in need at the time? It is one thing to talk about food banks, but it is important to ensure that we acknowledge when they were first set up in this country.

[Dr Sandher]

Did the guidance change between 2016 and 2024? Could the hon. Lady explain to me from the Opposition Front Bench why the number of food bank parcels tripled from the introduction of the two-child limit to 2024? I will give way if so.

[Rebecca Smith]

Well, without having the statistics in front of me right this second—[Interruption.] No, let me finish. We had the global pandemic, when there was a huge need for food banks. In fact, it was the Conservative Government who invested hundreds of thousands of pounds in food banks to ensure that nobody went without. The council for which I was a cabinet member at the time used the funding from the Conservative Government directly to ensure that poverty did not increase over the covid pandemic. If numbers went up, we have to ensure that that fact is reflected.

[Dr Sandher]

The rise happened before covid; it happened after the two-child limit was introduced. I agree with the hon. Lady on one point: she is not across the statistics.

Opposition Members have advanced an argument that I think is fair. They ask why we do not just create lots of jobs, which is the way to get out of poverty. The way to get out of poverty is through work, right? I want to take that argument head-on. We are living in a different technological era. In the post-war era, we had the advance and expansion of mass-production manufacturing, which meant there were good jobs for people as they left school. They left school, went to the local factory and earned a decent wage, meaning that they could buy a house and support a family.

Then, in the 1980s, in this country and indeed across high-income nations, we saw deindustrialisation and automation, bringing the replacement of those mechanical jobs with machines. Like other high-income nations across the world, we have been left with those who can use computers effectively—high-paid graduate workers—and lots of low-paid jobs everywhere else. It is not just us confronting that problem, although it is worse here because of decisions made in the 1980s; we are seeing it across high-income nations. As a result, state support is needed to ensure that those on low pay can afford a decent life.

[Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Dr Sandher]

In a moment.

This is not, by the way, the first time in history that we have confronted this problem. In the early part of the industrial revolution, between 1750 and 1850, we saw machines replace human beings. What did we see then? The economy grew by 60% per person, but people had less to eat. Men were shorter in 1850 than in 1750 because of the change of the technological era. I think my right hon. Friend would like to intervene.

[Gareth Snell]

I am an hon. Friend, not right honourable, though I welcome the promotion.

I have listened to this debate from outside the Chamber this afternoon and heard many Conservative Members talk about how the route out of poverty is through work. I absolutely and fundamentally agree with that, so I find it completely incongruous that whenever they have had the opportunity to vote for our make work pay Act, to increase stability in work and create well-paid jobs, they have voted against it. Indeed, only last week, the shadow Secretary of State made an argument for cutting the minimum wage for young people. How does my hon. Friend think that someone can argue, on the one hand, for work as a way out of poverty, but on the other, restrict the opportunities for work, push down pay and reduce the opportunities created for working people?

[Dr Sandher]

I agree with my hon. Friend. Conservative Members have often spoken about their employment record in office and how many jobs were created. Yet while that happened, child poverty and child hunger rose. Something is not right in their model of the world and there is something to review there.

There is no law of economics that says that just because someone works hard and is a decent person, they will earn a wage that can support a family. That is not the technological era we live in today. That is why we are ending the two-child limit today and I am so proud that we are doing so.

In an economic sense—in pounds and pence—as Labour Members realise and have stated, when we ensure that children have enough to eat, they learn more today and they earn more tomorrow. The cost of child poverty every single year is around £40 billion. The cost of ending the two-child limit is about £3.5 billion. It makes sense to invest today so that our children can eat and learn more, yet this is not just a matter of pounds and pence; as an economist, I often talk about that and I get it, but it is about so much more. This is about the moral argument. No child in this country should go hungry—no ifs, no buts and no exceptions. That is why I am so proud of this Bill, I am so proud to vote to end the two-child limit and I am so proud to be sat on the Labour Benches.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Slinger]

I thank my hon. Friend. I was very moved by his speech, which he delivered from a position of great knowledge and great concern built up over a very impressive career. He is absolutely right. I, of course, would not recommend people to take too seriously policies that are, as I said, populist policy hokey-cokey. To scrap or to reinstate? It is hard to tell. What we have seen from Reform UK is the concept of political triangulation being stretched absolutely to breaking point. In fact, it has broken, with some of the populist nonsense that Reform has spoken about in recent days.

[Dr Sandher]

I like a pint as well, as it happens—sometimes more than one—but I think it is fair to say that parents across this country will not appreciate getting 5p off each pint they buy, knowing that it will make more children hungry. I am pretty shocked by the trade-off there. I agree with supporting our pubs, and I will do it every single weekend as part of our patriotic duty, but that is not fair. There is another, more damaging, side to this which says that if we just deport and attack enough people, it will make us richer. That is absolutely something that we on this side of the House should reject, and something that Members on the other side of the House sometimes reject as well.

[John Slinger]

I could not have put it better, particularly the point my hon. Friend made about enjoying a pint. I too enjoy a pint, but linking something as serious as tackling child poverty to the price of a pint in our pubs is trivialising an incredibly serious topic—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Hinckley and Bosworth (Dr Evans) is speaking from a sedentary position. Would he like to intervene?

Welfare Spending

Jeevun Sandher Excerpts

Tuesday 4th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Jeevun Sandher (Loughborough) (Lab)]

Today’s motion represents the same failed punitive and cruel social security system that the Conservative party had for 14 years—a system that did not help people into good jobs or get social security spending down, and that led only to destitution. By contrast, our approach is to create good jobs, get good training in place, and help people into those jobs.

Let’s talk about the record of the Conservative party. Let’s talk about the rise in employment. The rise in employment was not among those who they punished. Non-graduate employment fell from about 73% when we were last in office, to 68% when the Conservatives left office. The rise in jobs was not among the non-graduates who they were punishing or those who they drove into destitution; the people who took those jobs were the increasing number of graduates. What was the cruelty that they put forward? They were measures that saw someone sanctioned because they went to their wife’s funeral, or that saw someone get punished because they went to a job interview—sanction after sanction, cruelty after cruelty.

It is the same with the Conservatives’ cuts—cuts that led to 3 million foodbank parcels being handed out. I did not know what a food bank was when I was growing up, yet every one of us in the Chamber knows what they are today. We see the growing destitution and homelessness before us, but what we did not see was any improvement in our country. There was no economic growth, and no extra good jobs. Cruelty and futility—that was the record of the Conservative party.

Think about where we are today. What do we need to do to ensure that people have decent jobs? We know that to live a decent life, a working family is this country needs to include two parents earning about £35,000 each, yet in 80% of this country the average wage is less than that. About 40% of full-time jobs pay less than £35,000. Going beyond that—[Interruption.] Would someone on the Opposition Benches like to intervene?

[Oliver Ryan]

To quote the shadow Secretary of State, my hon. Friend thinks he is “so clever”, arguing with facts! Those facts are not particularly appreciated by those on the Conservative Benches. Does he agree that what is important in this debate is the people who were left destitute by the policies of 14 years of Conservative government?

[Dr Sandher]

I could not agree more. When we go forward and think about how to create a good life for people, we first need to create good jobs, but we also need to ensure that people have the training and support they need to get there. That is exactly what this Government are doing.

We are creating good jobs by working with the private sector through our industrial strategy, and ensuring that the private sector gets the support it needs to work with businesses and—yes, of course—with trade unions. We are ensuring that there are good jobs for people to get into in the green economy and healthcare. We are creating the good jobs that people need and, more than that, the training they need. Through our work on the social security system, we are making sure that people can try work without the fear of losing their social security payments. That is the difference between us and the Conservative party. It is a difference in values.

We believe that every single person should be able to afford to live a decent life, that we should create good jobs for them to move into, and that the job of the Government is to work with the private sector to create those jobs directly, so that people can work and earn a decent wage. We are not about being punitive or cruel, and our measures will not lead to more destitution. That is the difference between Labour and the Conservatives. I am proud to be on these Benches; I do not know how they feel today.

Green Book Review

Jeevun Sandher Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd April 2025 Westminster Hall

[Dr Jeevun Sandher (Loughborough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Mrs Russell) for securing the debate.

The current design of the Green Book holds back communities such as mine in Loughborough, and by doing so holds back our country. Due to a flawed methodology, it overestimates the benefits of investment in London, and by doing so underestimates the benefits of investing elsewhere. It is one of the reasons why we have the most economically centralised nation in the OECD, and the reason why places that have been locked out of investment and growth are turning away from us in this place and away from democracy. I am so glad that the Chancellor is reviewing the Green Book at last to help spread investment across our nation, so that we can all reap the gains.

I represent a constituency in the east midlands—a region that has been left behind because of the decline of our great industries and chronic under-investment. The fall in industrial employment was one of the most rapid anywhere in Europe. Suddenly community centres were gone, jobs were lost and people’s sense of purpose and dignity disappeared. On top of that, and contributing to it, my region has the lowest transport investment in the country. We need to end this cycle of decline, because it is holding back our nation. We need to invest in communities such as mine to make the country a better place and to help create good jobs.

For too long, investment has been biased towards London and the south-east. Someone living in London gets £800 more infrastructure spending per year than the national average. That is because the cost-benefit analysis set out in the Green Book to evaluate projects has a hardwired London bias. First, the Green Book prices the benefits of projects in a way that benefits places with higher wages—namely, London. Secondly, it does not estimate the wider impact of investment on growth.

To take the first issue, hourly wages are higher in London, and the benefits of transport projects are calculated in terms of commuting time saved. That commuting time is priced in wages, so according to the current methodology, one hour saved is worth more in London than elsewhere. The projected benefits of investing in London become larger, more projects are built here and the logic because self-fulfilling.

To take the second issue, economies are dynamic—they respond to investment. Better transport allows businesses to attract more customers and workers. It gets economies growing and wages rising. But the Green Book does not account for those dynamic effects. Instead, it assumes that every single project is marginal to an area. It assumes that projects do not influence either growth or prices around the area in which they take place.

The review is taking place precisely because the Government know that investing in our regions outside London will make us all better off. Getting the basics right—more investment outside London, and basic transport infrastructure—will do a lot more for growth than another infrastructure project in London. That is the change we need.

To achieve all of that, we need to overcome the tyranny of the cost-benefit analysis. It has to be confronted and destroyed. This review must not be like reviews of the past. Warm words about regional inequalities are not enough. We need to change a flawed methodology and appreciate the dynamic benefits of investment.

For non-graduates in communities such as mine, it is far more difficult to find a good job than it is here in the capital. The jobs available to my constituents are less secure and lower paid, because we do not get the public investment we need. Our future has been held back by a flawed methodology and a system that does not work for my community, my region or indeed the country.

When people cannot see a good future, their anger grows. We can end that anger, and rebuild hope and a better future, by changing the Green Book so that investment takes place outside London—in my community and in communities across the nation. We can create good jobs, get wages rising and drive growth across the country.

Welfare Cap

Jeevun Sandher Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Jeevun Sandher (Loughborough) (Lab)]

Every person in this country should be able to live a decent life, but too many of us are unable to earn a decent wage. That is what is pushing up social security spending, leading to the motions that we are debating today. Too many people are forced to claim sickness benefits because the NHS has failed them; there are not enough well-paid jobs; and people do not engage with the social security system that the Conservative party left us, because it demonised and attacked them.

That left us as an incoming Labour Government with a choice between massive implementing cuts to social security this year and technically breaching the welfare cap. I am proud that this Government have chosen to breach that cap rather than drive people into destitution. I am proud that we will get people who want to work into work, and that we will change the system for the future to ensure that people are not left as they have been for the past 14 years. I am proud that this Government will ensure that every person has the support they need when they need it.

Our nation is sick, and things need to change—specifically, three things. First, our NHS needs to shift. After 14 years of mismanagement and the disastrous Lansley reforms, we have almost 3 million people out of work. We were the only G7 nation to see sickness rise during the pandemic and after it as well. Every single one of us sees that degradation and damage when we try to get an appointment with our local GP. That is what we need to fix in the years ahead.

Secondly, we must transform our low-pay, low-training economy, which does not provide enough good jobs or pay enough to live. Thousands of people are unable to turn on the heating because they cannot afford it, and thousands are unable to eat; nurses are forced to go to food banks. Around 70% of children in poverty are in working families, and being cold and hungry makes people sicker. Too many people in this country go straight from school into sickness; the number of young people in this nation who are too sick to be active in the labour market has almost doubled since 2013. Those are the problems that we will be fixing in the years ahead.

The third thing that needs to change, of course, is the punitive social security system that pushed people to the brink. When people could not see their GP, could not earn enough to live a decent life and were too scared to go to the jobcentre, they stopped working altogether. That has led us in this country into a toxic doom loop, with sicker people having less money in their pockets and becoming too sick to work, leading to higher social security payments. The amount we are spending on social security is a sign not of the former Conservative Government’s generosity, but of their failure. That is what we will be addressing in the year ahead.

The amount that we are spending on sickness and disability benefits has risen from £42 billion in 2010 to £65 billion today, and that is in real terms, not nominal terms. That is an increase of around 40% to 50%. That is why we will breach the cap by £8.6 billion this year, rather than impose devastating and swingeing cuts on those who already cannot afford to eat. We on the Labour Benches know that food banks are not an integral part of our welfare system; they are a symbol of failure. These are the things that we must change in the future.

We need changes not simply to policy but in attitudes. For 14 years it was said that every person who was failing to earn enough was somehow a skiver. That was wrong, and it drove those who needed to engage with the social security system not to engage with it at all. I used to work at the Department for Work and Pensions and I can tell the House that people on both sides—those who wanted to work and those who wanted to help people into work—were good people who were let down by a bad system.

[Chris Curtis (Milton Keynes North) (Lab)]

Somebody who works in my local jobcentre in Milton Keynes came to visit me last week and told me about his experiences. He currently has to conduct 10-minute appointments, and as a lot of that time is spent on admin, he is not able to give the necessary help and support to people who are desperate to find a job. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is really important that this Government, unlike the previous Government, focus on providing the support necessary to get people into work, rather than setting a narrative about people being workshy and not wanting to work, which is not the truth?

[Dr Sandher]

I could not agree more with my hon. Friend. Ten minutes is nowhere near enough time for people to get the job support they need. It is not enough for those who are seeking help or for those seeking to give that help, especially as the economy is changing and getting a well-paid job requires more training. The country changed before with the automative revolution, and it is now changing with the artificial intelligence revolution. Those people need support and help in order to get security, but they are not guaranteed it or given it at the moment, and that is the precise intention of the changes we are putting forward. It is not easy to put forward these changes and it will not take a short time, but by starting that work today and by changing the relationship between those who are seeking to give help and those who are receiving that help, we can ensure that those who need help will actually receive it.

This is not just about those on the ground who are doing great work, or indeed about my former brilliant colleagues at the DWP. It is also about how we in this House speak about those who need help, who are in poverty or who receive social security payments. We must understand that every single person in this country wants to work and wants the dignity that comes with it, but they are too often let down because of a lack of well-paid jobs, a lack of support and a lack of dignity afforded to them by a party that sought only to demonise. That is what we seek to change in this House and, indeed, in this country. That is the choice before us, and it is why we are making these decisions: a technical breach of the welfare cap this year and a more accurate welfare cap in the years ahead, so that we can begin to provide the support that people need.

[Kirsty Blackman]

People go to food banks because work does not pay and the two-child cap, for example, means that they do not have enough money to live on or to support their families. Why is the hon. Member supporting a welfare cap that bakes in the two-child limit?

[Dr Sandher]

I do not believe that the hon. Member is correct. The welfare cap does not define future decisions; the welfare cap in future years defines the total amount that will be spent at that time. We should be clear what the welfare cap refers to. She mentioned the two-child limit in particular, and Government Members have been clear that choices have to be made in straitened times. We know that children are driven into poverty and that no child deserves to be born into such circumstances. Indeed, we know about the huge and shocking rise in child poverty and child hunger in this country. I know that Members across the House are shocked by that, but the truth is that we cannot make every such decision in this House because these are straitened times. However, I appreciate the intervention and, indeed, the good faith in which it was made. There is a lot we have to change in this country, and I am sure we will do so in the years ahead.

The choice before us today is simple. The technical breach this year and the change in the years to come are the right choices, and we are making them for the right reasons. Many in work today cannot make it pay, and that is why we will make sure that people who are in work get the training they need. That is not just about the training they need to get a better job; it is about the support they need to ensure that their healthcare, and indeed their health, is good enough to continue working.

More broadly, we must ensure that every single person in the country can have a decent job that pays enough, and we are taking action in three areas to do that. First and foremost, there is our action on the NHS and through the Darzi review, because we should not live a country where almost 3 million people are too sick to work. We have offered thousands more appointments to get waiting lists down, because people who cannot see a GP today are far more likely to end up out of work tomorrow.

Secondly, we are helping people get into work. There are the 16 trailblazer programmes to join up work skills and health support, and the £115 million to help those with complex needs get back into work.

Thirdly, we are creating good jobs for young people with the youth guarantee, so that every single young person in this country can access the training they need and the apprenticeships they require.

The fundamental reforms the Chancellor set out in her speech today are also about supporting people into work so they can contribute to our economy, and do what they need to do to get a decent life for themselves and their family. Having a decent job and earning enough to live is about more than the pound in a person’s pocket; it is about a sense of contentment and something to talk about with their mates. It gives meaning to each day.

[Robin Swann (South Antrim) (UUP)]

The hon. Member has talked eloquently about the challenges of getting into the workplace. Does he realise that a large number of people across our society who are economically inactive have the desire to look for work and have welfare payments to support them getting into work, but sometimes through no fault of their own the system works against them?

[Dr Sandher]

I thank the hon. Member for that point. Indeed, that is the entire reason why we are changing the system today. Yes, it is about practical changes and providing more support, but it is also about a change of tone, a change of attitude and treating people like human beings. That is exactly what Labour Members believe.

These reforms and support, at their core, are about ensuring that every single person has a decent job, which gives them meaning and something to talk about with their mates. A previous Labour Government did that so well, and that is how we got poverty down. A previous Member for Sedgefield, who is a shining light for us on the Labour Benches, promised to end child poverty in a generation, and a previous Member for Dunfermline, who is a hero to us, put that into practice and reduced child poverty by almost a million. It is that Labour tradition to which I speak. That Labour tradition is why I am proud to stand here today, and that is why I am proud to vote in favour of these motions.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jeevun Sandher Excerpts

Monday 16th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Before I call Dr Jeevun Sandher, may I offer him my congratulations on his engagement?

[Dr Jeevun Sandher (Loughborough) (Lab)]

That is incredibly kind of you, Mr Speaker.

Young non-graduates are finding it far harder to get good, well-paid jobs. The number of young people not in education, employment or training has nearly doubled since 2013, and youth unemployment is at its highest rate in almost a decade because young people are not getting the skills they need. On top of that, they are becoming far sicker; one in three young people currently has a mental health problem, and that figure is rising. What are the Government and the Department doing to give young people the skills and the health support that they need to get good, well-paying jobs?

[Alison McGovern]

That question demonstrates the quality analysis I would expect from recently engaged economists on the Labour Benches. The Minister for Skills and I have been working closely on the youth guarantee, because we know that it is only by colleges and jobcentres working in hand in hand that we will get young people the skills that they need to succeed.