Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment his Department has made of the effect of the benefit cap on levels of persistent poverty in the UK.
Impacts of the benefit cap on levels of persistent poverty have not been estimated.
The benefit cap does not affect working families. The latest statistics from Income Dynamics show that work continues to be the best route out of poverty. Both working-age adults and children are less likely to be in persistent low income households where at least one adult worked.
Full analysis of persistent low income is available in Income Dynamics (published in March 2017). The government is committed to measuring the percentage of children in persistent low income, as set out in the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016.