The Daily Dazzling Dawn

Two-child benefit cap impact; large families more likely to go hungry

by DD Newsroom

July 25, 2024

key takeaways

The Food Foundation reports that nearly 25% of households with three children were food insecure as of last month.

The charity said that the results demonstrate how the two-child benefit cap has an impact.

Families are only eligible to receive up to two children as part of the ceiling on financial support.

This implies that for third or later children born after April 2017, parents are not eligible to receive the child elements of Universal Credit or tax credits, which can total up to £3,455 annually.

Over 1.6million children don't get £288 a month in extra support due to the rule, according to DWP figures.

The Food Foundation's online survey asked 6,177 adults in the UK whether in the previous month, they had reduced the size of or skipped meals because they couldn't afford or get access to food, or if they had been hungry but not eaten due to unaffordability or inaccessibility of food.

The charity's polling, carried out by YouGov, found that 14% of households were judged by these measures to have experienced food insecurity.

When it came to households with children, almost a fifth (18%) reported experiencing food insecurity, compared with 12% of households without children.

Single-adult households with children were nearly twice as likely to be food insecure as households with multiple adults and a child or children, at 31% compared to 16%.

The new Prime Minister Kier Starmer has been facing mounting pressure from his own backbenchers over the cap.