Contribution
I was actually referring to the number of Opposition Members defending this policy here today. I do not think there is a single person in the country who will defend keeping hundreds of thousands more children in poverty. That is what we are getting rid of today, and that is what the hon. Gentleman’s party is defending. It is difficult to think of another policy in modern Britain that is so stark in its design and so devastating in its impact. This policy, for nearly a decade, has quietly and cruelly shaped and limited the life chances of children across this country. Poverty impacts children before they are even born, and its effects continue to be felt in myriad ways at every stage of life after that.
Children growing up in poverty are more likely to experience mental and physical health issues and to do worse in school. They are more likely to be unemployed, earn less or be in low-skilled work than their peers, and they are more likely to experience homelessness and poor health. The shadow Secretary of State said that it is a trap for worklessness. No, this policy is a trap for worklessness, which is exactly what it has achieved over the previous few years. The consequences of poverty are severe and long-lasting, with children born into poverty ultimately having lower life expectancies. Life is shorter because of poverty, and poverty exists in its extreme because of this policy.
For children growing up in a low-income household in my county of Suffolk, education disadvantage starts before they even begin school, and it compounds at every stage of their education. The latest figures from the Education Policy Institute’s 2025 disadvantage report shows that, before kids even enter primary school, they are almost half a year behind their peers. By the time they finish key stage 3, as they choose their options, they are a staggering 21.7 months behind—that is nearly two full school years before they even begin studying for their GCSEs. The translation of this deprivation gap over every stage of a child’s education to their examination results is tangible and stark: disadvantaged students in Suffolk are 4.4 grades behind at the age of 16.
I remember being a councillor during the pandemic, and I saw the enormous impact that this had on so many families, as many Members will remember. Never mind huddling around a kitchen or dining room table trying to work, many families did not have a kitchen or dining room table. Indeed, many disadvantaged students in places like Ipswich were left without electronic devices, such as laptops, for many months. I had hoped that that would be a watershed moment in how we view the link between education and poverty. Instead, what I saw in opposition, as a county councillor in Suffolk, was more cuts to children’s centres and more than a halving of health visitors, yet we wonder why we have such problems now when young children enter education for the first time. It is an absolute disgrace that even now—even after the impact we have seen and all the evidence we have seen—the Conservatives cannot bring themselves to support measures that reduce child poverty.
I am proud to support this Bill, because scrapping the two-child limit will have one of the greatest impacts on driving down child poverty. That one action will lift 450,000 children across our country out of poverty, including more than 3,000 in my town of Ipswich. Through this action, alongside an enormous package of other actions that our Government are taking, we will take over half a million children out of poverty—the largest reduction in a single Parliament since records began.
The two-child limit is quite simply wrong. The number of brothers and sisters that a child has should never determine whether they go hungry or how well they do in school, and no child should be punished simply for existing. Tackling child poverty is in our Labour party’s DNA, and today I could not be prouder to be a Labour MP, because today this Labour Government are following in the footsteps of every Labour Government who came before them by lifting children out of poverty and transforming children’s lives.