ALMOST 21,000 households in Scotland are missing out on vital income due to the UK Government’s “two-child limit” policy, new figures from the UK Government reveal.
In Scotland, 20,740 households in receipt of Universal Credit or Child Tax Credit do not receive payment for at least one child due to the cruel policy. Across the UK, this shoots up to 359,250 households affected.
Shockingly, 1830 women across the UK have had to relive the trauma of rape or coercive control in order to make a claim under the “rape clause”, with 110 of these cases being from Scotland.
The “two child limit and rape clause” policy was announced by former chancellor George Osborne (below) in his summer budget plans in 2015. The UK Government defended the policy which ends entitlement to support for the third child onwards, saying it encourages people to think about “whether they can afford to have more children”.
The "rape clause" is among the exemptions to the policy if a child is conceived as a result of rape. The exemption means that a woman applying for the payment has to give details, reliving her trauma, if applying for a third or subsequent child about how she was raped.
Faith leaders, women’s welfare groups, trade unions and child poverty campaigners have all condemned the policy, with many sexual violence support charities refusing to act as third party verifiers for the UK Government.
Campaigning SNP MP Alison Thewliss has demanded the cruel two-child limit and rape clause be scrapped following new figures showing 359,000 households were missing out on vital income due to the policy.
The Glasgow Central MP has campaigned to have the two-child limit – which restricts entitlement to benefits to the first two children per family – scrapped since it was first announced in 2015.
Alison Thewliss, SNP MP pointed out that the figures revealed that “the majority of affected households have at least one adult in work”, “shattering” Tory claims of “fairness”, and called the rape clause “deeply cruel and damaging”.
“Any government with an ounce of common sense or compassion would have already scrapped it”, Thewliss said. “As well as seeing families out of pocket, it also deliberately puts women through mental and emotional anguish in forcing them to disclose horrific details under the rape clause, and has been found to have an impact on women’s decisions to terminate pregnancies.
“The Covid-19 pandemic shows that no one can comprehensively prepare for any eventuality. The social security safety net should be there to support people, not punish them.
“At a time when the Scottish Government is putting money into people’s pockets with progressive policies like the Scottish Child Payment, the Tories are taking it away again with callous policies like the two-child cap.
“There can be no doubt that the only way to protect families in Scotland is with independence."
