The two-child benefit cap is trapping people in abusive relationships. As part of our Real Britain series, we hear from mum of four and abuse survivor, Juliet, who says the cruel policy is making life harder for survivors of abuse and it means children will go hungry over the summer holidays. Real Britain is a Mirror series that stands up for your community and asks how politics affects real people.
If Juliet had known about the two-child benefit cap before she left her abusive husband – she says she would not have left him.
“At the time I wasn’t thinking about what support I’d get as things were too difficult,” she says, explaining the terrifying balance between different harms to her children. “But if I’d have known how hard it would be financially, I don’t think I could have left.” She fears that this is how dangerous the two-child policy could be for other parents facing domestic abuse. “It’s so hard to leave an abusive relationship and this just would have been another reason not to leave. It’s so hard on your own. The whole system is against you.”
Juliet, a mother-of-four who is unable to share her real name because of escaping domestic violence, is an NHS call-handler in North West England. She has a stressful job which she does in school hours because of a lack of wraparound care. She also helps look after her mother, who is terminally ill. When we speak, she is on a rainy day off trying to find free ways to entertain her kids who are off for the school holidays. Her children, 16, 14, seven and five, are “good kids” she says, “who know not to ask for things”. But even so, life is a struggle despite her life-saving job.
“I would just say that our life is very limited,” she says, simply. “Like I really want the two younger ones to learn to swim this summer and I just can’t afford the lessons. I only shop fortnightly, and the fresh food runs out in the first few days.” Juliet earns a decent salary in the hours she is able to work, and knows many more are worse off. “There are lots of deprived families where I live, more so than me. There are little kids who will be just wandering around hungry for the six weeks of the school holiday.”
‘Little kids will be wandering around hungry’
This is the reality of the two-child benefit cap that has become a thorn in the side of the new Labour government. A government with a frontbench full of people committed to ending child poverty and supporting women experiencing domestic violence – including people who came into politics entirely motivated by one or both of these ideas. Yet on Tuesday night, that party found itself in the contradictory position of punishing seven MPs who voted to remove the cap with removal of the whip. To the millions of people affected, it didn’t just feel like playing party politics with child poverty – it felt like their lives were being put on trial.
“The things you heard said about you and your family are really hard to take,” Juliet says. “It’s like every radio and TV programme is talking about you and saying you are a scrounger.” Radio call-ins often lambast lone parents for having children they can’t afford, but ignore the many families affected who already had more than two children when their lives fell apart.
‘This policy misunderstands the messy human world of relationships’
Before Juliet and her ex split in 2021 they had four children together as a married couple and were both working. Their third child was born just before the cap came in, but now Juliet has no support for her youngest child. The policy misunderstands the messy human world of relationship break-ups and breakdowns, domestic violence, mental health problems, bereavements, insecure work and lost jobs. In other words, the things that can happen to most of us – even MPs – at any time.
Dating back to George Osborne’s vicious austerity cuts, the two-child limit affects children born after April 2017 and applies to two benefits, Universal Credit and Child Tax Credit. For some families, the Institute for Fiscal Studies says this can amount to a loss of £3,455 per child, per year.
The Child Poverty Action Group says abolishing the two-child limit would immediately lift 300,000 children out of poverty and mean 700,000 children are in “less deep” poverty – “making a significant difference to the lives of over a million children”.
The two-child limit once put the Conservative Party at odds with figures from former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the vast majority of Britain’s trade unions and most children’s charities. Now, Labour finds itself standing in the Tories’ place. Instead of ending the two-child policy, it has announced a child poverty review. While a review is welcomed by charities and affected families alike, every day in poverty is a day too long.
‘Remove this cruel policy as a matter of urgency’
“We are really pleased to see the new government getting straight to business to tackle child poverty,” says Ruth Talbot, founder of Single Parent Rights. “Labour have already set up a child poverty task force and Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson has said removing this policy is one of the measures that will be considered as part of their review. “We call on them to listen to organisations like ours who have been working with impacted families like Juliet’s for years.
“Ending the two-child limit is a huge opportunity for Labour to materially impact an unprecedented number of children. They must remove this cruel policy as a matter of urgency.”
A DWP spokesperson said: “No child should be in poverty – and we are committed to ensuring that children across the country have the best start in life. “That’s why our new ministerial task force will begin the urgent work of developing an ambitious child poverty strategy, looking at all available levers across government to help tackle the crisis.”
Juliet welcomes the child poverty review and has plenty of her own suggestions – from reforming the Child Maintenance Service (the former Child Support Agency) to widening eligibility for free school meals and radically overhauling Universal Credit. “As an emergency call-handler, we get asked by the Universal Credit helpline to dispatch ambulances to people in distress, that’s how much I know UC is a broken benefit,” she says.
But the review – even if it happens in time for Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ first budget – will not happen overnight. And in the meantime, for Juliet’s family, fresh food is running out and her younger children – like two million other primary-school kids from low-income backgrounds – don’t have life-saving swimming skills.
“I don’t know how people who earn less than me in minimum wage jobs survive,” Juliet says. “Kids are going without basic necessities because of this policy. It’s cruel. No one should suffer like this in England. I don’t even want these benefits. I wish I didn’t need them.”
While the desire of Labour frontbenchers to end poverty is not in doubt, the fact remains that – without immediate intervention – families like Juliet’s face a long, difficult summer.
If you, or someone you know, has been affected by the issues raised in this article, you can seek advice and access resources through the NHS.
