For immediate release:
LOCAL MSP SLAMS LABOUR FOR ABANDONING PLEDGE TO TACKLE CHILD POVERTY
Rutherglen MSP Clare Haughey has said “independence is the only route to real change” – as the Labour Party was criticised for abandoning a key pledge to tackle child poverty.
Labour leader Keir Starmer has been roundly criticised for announcing that he would keep the cruel Tory two child cap – which impacts more than 80,000 children in Scotland – if he became Prime Minister.
The two-child cap prevents parents from claiming Child Tax Credit or Universal Credit for any third or subsequent child born after April 2017 – unless a mother can prove she had a third or subsequent child as the result of rape.
Peter Kelly, Director of Poverty Alliance, has said the two-child cap is the “worst of the welfare ‘reforms’ of the last 13 years” and that “any politician that claims to care about poverty, about increasing food banks use, about the well-being of kids needs to commit to scrap this terrible policy”.
New analysis, conducted by the SNP using the latest data available from the UK government Department for Work and Pensions, reveals South Lanarkshire is amongst the hardest hit local authorities in Scotland by the two-child benefit cap.
Glasgow is the worst impacted in Scotland with 3,990 households (54 percent) in receipt of Universal Credit or Child Tax Credits not receiving financial support for at least one child in April 2023. In South Lanarkshire, 1,420 families – 55 percent of households – are being hit by the cap.
1,830 families are being impacted in North Lanarkshire.
Rutherglen MSP Clare Haughey has slammed Labour for abandoning the key pledge to tackle child poverty.
Commenting, Clare Haughey MSP said:
“The cruel Tory two child cap has been one of the leading causes of poverty in the UK – and if Keir Starmer continues to impose it, the pro-Brexit Labour Party will be directly responsible for pushing thousands of Scottish children into poverty.
“The SNP Government will take more than 90,000 children out of poverty with progressive policies like the Scottish Child Payment – which incidentally there is no child cap on – but for every step we take forward, damaging Westminster policies are dragging us back again.
“Voters in Scotland are used to child poverty under the Tories – but with Starmer refusing to scrap the two-child cap, people here are rightly asking: ‘what is the point of Labour?’
“Independence is the only route to real change. At the next election, voting SNP is the only way to secure independence, tackle the cost of living, and get rid of unelected Tory governments for good.”
ENDS
Notes:
Keir Starmer’s comments on the two-child cap: https://twitter.com/andrewlearmonth/status/1680492992237383680
Peter Kelly’s comments:
Full tables for local authorities across Scotland and the UK available here (Table 9) – https://mcusercontent.com/4fae14f57a18ee08253ffc251/files/734a0fc6-ee34-a6bf-8a42-1bfc7f78f499/Data_Tables_UC_and_Child_Tax_Credit_Claimants.ods
Image of local authority breakdown:
Clare Haughey MSP 