Reform UK would restore the two-child benefit cap in full with no carve-outs for British working families, Robert Jenrick has announced.
It is the party’s second U-turn on the policy, after leader Nigel Farage suggested last year he was planning to scrap it in an effort to encourage people to have more children.
He later shifted to suggest the cap would only be scrapped for British working families – meaning those with two British parents who work full-time.
That approach was still intact at the beginning of this month, when Farage said bringing back the cap for most welfare recipients would help pay for a hospitality VAT cut.
But Jenrick – who was formally handed the role of Reform’s Treasury spokesperson yesterday – will use an event at the City of London today to reveal he was rowing back on that idea.
He said the move would ‘defuse the benefits bomb set to bankrupt Britain’.
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The former Tory immigration minister told the press conference: ‘Today, Reform is changing our policy on the two-child cap for Universal Credit.
‘We want to help working families have more children. But right now, we just cannot afford to do so with welfare. So it has to go.
‘And, as Reform’s Shadow Chancellor, I’m ending it. A Reform Government will restore the cap in full.’
The party’s initial stance on the cap – back when it was in favour of ending it – helped to increase pressure on Chancellor Rachel Reeves from Labour MPs.
She finally committed to scrapping the policy at the autumn Budget, a move applauded by campaigners and charities who said it would lift hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty.
Parliament voted to back the move at the Bill’s second reading on February 3, and it is set to come to an end from April.
Speaking earlier this month when Reform last announced plans to partially restore the cap, Lucy Schonegavel of charity Action for Children said such a move would be ‘disastrous’ for the ‘children and families affected’.
The two-child benefit limit was introduced by Conservative Chancellor George Osborne under David Cameron’s coalition government.
Farage’s change of tack comes after his party welcomed a significant number of former Tories, including Jenrick and his fellow serving MPs Suella Braverman and Andrew Rosindell in January alone.
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