Labour’s Angela Rayner has voiced support for abolishing the two-child benefit limit, aiming to combat child poverty. Rayner, a former Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, drew from her own upbringing to argue against penalizing children for their families’ circumstances. She emphasized that the benefit is modest at £20 weekly and discredited the notion that people have children solely for benefits.

In an interview with the Sunday Mirror, Rayner applauded recent signals from Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves hinting at the removal of the two-child benefit cap in an upcoming announcement. She stressed the urgency of addressing child poverty, citing the detrimental impact of the current policy.

Rayner urged the government to consider the evidence and uphold Labour’s values in prioritizing the well-being of children. She emphasized the need to avoid destitution among children and empathized with families facing challenging circumstances, asserting that children should not bear the brunt of financial constraints.

This week, over 40 celebrities, including Arlene Phillips, Mark Bonnar, Jason Isaacs, and Bill Nighy, united to advocate for scrapping the two-child benefit limit in the Budget. In a letter to the Prime Minister coordinated by the foodbank charity Trussell, they urged immediate action to alleviate the hardship imposed on children by the policy.

The two-child benefit limit, implemented during the Conservative era in 2017, restricts child tax credit and universal credit to the first two children in most households. The Prime Minister expressed personal commitment to reducing child poverty rates, which currently affect around 4.5 million children nationwide.