Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask His Majesty's Government how the Child Poverty Strategy addresses the higher risk of poverty in larger families.

We are determined to lift children out of poverty irrespective of the size of their family.

The removal of the two child limit will lift 450,000 children out of poverty, rising to around 550,000 alongside other measures set out in our Strategy, such as the expansion of free school meals. These interventions will lead to the largest expected reduction in child poverty over a Parliament since comparable records began.

We know that large families are disproportionately impacted by the high cost of childcare.

That is why alongside wider changes to strengthen childcare support, we are also specifically increasing childcare support for large families. Currently, the amount of UC childcare that families with two or more children could claim back is capped at £1768.94 a month. We recognise that childcare costs apply to each individual child and it is not right that we have a system that doesn’t reflect this.

We are increasing UC childcare support to help with the childcare costs for all children instead of limiting this to two children, supporting parents who have larger families into work. Eligible parents will receive up to £737.06 in UC childcare support for each additional child beyond the second.