The benefit cap restricts the amount of support a working-age household can receive from the social security system. Those most likely to be capped are lone parents, larger families and families with young children.
Scotland is already mitigating the benefit cap as fully as possible within its devolved powers. In Northern Ireland, a supplementary payment is available for some households with children affected by the cap.
“The food’s gone up, electric’s gone up, everything seems to have gone up, everything’s gone up and it was bad enough before but now it’s just, your life ain’t any life, we don’t go out, we don’t get to do nothing, we’re just here… I can’t afford to use the gas in this house is freezing cold."
From our briefing: Falling further behind: hardship among benefit capped families as prices rise
The logic for the benefit cap is fundamentally flawed. It has a negligible effect on work incentives, while taking money away from the poorest families. The main reason families are unable to earn enough from paid work to escape the cap is there are significant barriers to employment, such as ill health or childcare.
Removing the benefit cap would help some of the poorest families across the country.
Some recent posts from us that refer to the benefit cap.
In line with inflation, today benefits are being uprated by 6.7 per cent. For the first time in four…
Our pre-Budget briefing details how best to invest financial support in children to reduce child…
There are over four million children now living in poverty in the UK. We set out what the government…
The cost of raising a child to age 18 is £166,000 for a couple and £220,000 for a lone parent.
Please note that the benefit cap is different from the two-child limit.
