Starmer says Reform UK and Tories are in ‘cruel alliance’, as bill to get rid of two-child benefit cap unveiled – UK politics live | Politics
Starmer says Reform UK and Tories are in ‘cruel alliance’ to raise child poverty, as bill to get rid of two-child benefit cap unveiled
Good morning. Today is an important day for anti-poverty policy because the government is publishing its universal credit (removal of two-child limit) bill, the legislation that will implement the budget pledge to get rid of the Tory law that removed child-related UC benefit payments for third and subsequent children. The government says this will lift almost 500,000 children out of poverty – making this the biggest single anti child poverty measure implemented by a government in modern times.
Keir Starmer is on a visit this morning publicising the legislation. What is interesting about this is that, before the 2024 general election, Starmer was not just not committing to get rid of the cap; he was presenting that as evidence to voters that Labour would be tough on spending. In July 2023 he told Laura Kuenssberg he was “not changing that policy”. And, when challenged about this two days later at a conference with a leftwing audience, he said:
We keep saying collectively as a party that we have to make tough decisions. And in the abstract, everyone says: ‘That’s right Keir.’ But then we get into the tough decision – we’ve been in one of those for the last few days – and they say: ‘We don’t like that, can we just not make that one, I’m sure there is another tough decision somewhere else we can make.’ But we have to take the tough decisions.
Two and a half years later, the line is very different. Today Starmer will talk proudly about getting rid of the two-child benefit cap and use child poverty as an issue to attack Reform UK and the Tories. According to extracts released in advance, he will say:
Nigel Farage seems intent on linking arms with the Conservatives in a cruel alliance to push kids who need help back into poverty. This child poverty pact is something that should worry us all. These aren’t numbers on a spreadsheet – these are children’s life chances at stake.
Labour chooses the other road – lifting almost half a million kids out of child poverty – and that’s what we’re doing this year. It’s the right thing to do for them, their families and our economy. It’s astonishing that Reform and the Tories would undo that change and leave a lost generation of kids in every corner of Britain.
The Conservatives would bring back the two-child benefit cap in full, and Reform UK would bring it back for all families, apart from those with two parents working full-time. Labour analysis says this means just 3,700 of the 470,000 families affected by the cap would benefit from the Nigel Farage exemption.
At a press conference yesterday Farage offered a new argument (which has not been set out as formal Reform UK policy), suggesting benefits like this should only go to British-born people. As Jessica Elgot reports, Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, responded by suggesting this was immoral.
Getting rid of the two-child benefit cap will cost about £3bn. The Tories and Reform UK are both saying that, by gettting rid of benefit spending like this, they would free up money for tax cuts. But, in an interview this morning, Pat McFadden, the work and pensions secretary, argued that this £3bn was “an investment in children’s future”. He told Sky News:
We came into office with a manifesto commitment to reduce child poverty. We did it the last time we were in power. Child poverty has risen by about 900,000 since 2010.
I don’t see this just as a cash transfer in terms of that £3 billion, I see it as an investment in children’s future, because we know that children from the poorest families will end up doing less well at school, less than a quarter of them get five good GCSEs, we know they’re four times more likely to have mental health problems later in life.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.35am: Emma Reynolds, the environment secretary, speaks at the Oxford Farming Conference. As Helena Horton reports, she will say smaller farms will be prioritised for nature funding.
10am: Tim Davie, the outgoing director general of the BBC, and interim chief executive Jonathan Munro give evidence to the Commons public accounts committee about the BBC World Service.
Morning: Keir Starmer and Bridget Philliipson, the education secretary, are on a visit in Bedfordshire linked to the publication of the bill getting rid of the two-child benefit cap.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
11.30am: Lilian Greenwood, the transport minister, gives a statement to MPs on the road safety strategy announced yesterday.
Late afternoon: Peers debate a motion tabled by Charlie Falconer saying they should agreed to speed up the debate on the assisted dying bill so that it can return to the Commons in “reasonable time”.
Also, at some point this afternoon (UK time), David Lammy, the deputy PM, is meeting JD Vance, the US vice president. But a press conference has not been scheduled, and it is not clear yet how much either of them will want to say about their conversation.
If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line when comments are open (normally between 10am and 3pm at the moment), or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.
If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. You can reach me on Bluesky at @andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social. The Guardian has given up posting from its official accounts on X, but individual Guardian journalists are there, I still have my account, and if you message me there at @AndrewSparrow, I will see it and respond if necessary.
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Key events
John Healey declines to comment on report saying up to 7,500 UK troops would go Ukraine as part of peacekeeping force
According to a report by Larisa Brown in the Times, Britain would send fewer than 7,500 troops to Ukraine as part of the Coalition of the Willing plans to boost the country’s security in the event of a peace deal. The total force would number about 15,000 soldiers at most, with France providing most of the others, she says.
Brown reports:
UK military chiefs had originally proposed sending 10,000 troops as part of a wider 64,000-strong “coalition of the willing” force but this has been deemed unsustainable inside the Ministry of Defence given the current size of the British Army.
The assumption is that fewer than 7,500 British soldiers will be deployed, two military sources disclosed, although that figure is also expected to be a struggle for the UK, which has only around 71,000 trained personnel in the regular army.
In the Commons last night John Healey, the defence secretary, was repeatedly asked about this report when he gave a statement to MPs about the Coalition of the Willing deal, and the UK’s involvement in the US seizure of a sanctioned, Russian-flagged tanker.
Healey refused to confirm the figure, but he did not dismiss it either. In response to one of the questions about it, he told MPs:
I will simply not go into detail on the nature of the activities in the deployment,the numbers of troops that are likely to be deployed to Ukraine or the commitments that other nations have made … We will deploy only if there is a ceasefire and a peace agreement. Disclosing, let alone debating, those sort of details would only make Putin wiser.
Emma Reynolds faces protest as she speaks at Oxford Farming Conference
Helena Horton
Helena Horton is a Guardian environment reporter.
Environment secretary Emma Reynolds is on a charm offensive with farmers at the Oxford Farming Conference today.
Farmers have told the Guardian that her team has been anxious to organise one to one meetings with them and the secretary of state. She will be spending the day speaking to individual farmers and farming groups, and listening to their concerns. Farming minister Angela Eagle will be having dinner with farmers at the Oxford Real Farming Conference (a rival conference focused on organic and regenerative farming) tonight.
Farmers have been extremely displeased so far with the Labour government, which recently did a partial U-turn on a policy to introduce a new inheritance tax on agricultural land and property. Labour has also hiked tax on fertilisers and some farming vehicles.
Since the U-turn, which exempts farming families with up to £5m of assets from the new tax, Reynolds is hoping she can win over the rural community. A recent poll found that 0% of famers would vote Labour.
This morning, a small protest of tractors has gathered outside the Examination Halls, where the conference is taking place. They are already beeping in an extremely irritating way, and do not seem placated by the U Turn.
Today, Reynolds is due to announce a re-opening of the delayed Sustainable Farming Incentive scheme and prioritise it towards small farmers.
Henry Tufnell, who represents Mid and South Pembrokeshire and who is in the rural caucus of Labour MPs and sits on the environment committee, is at the conference. He said his “one wish for 2026” is a “reset of Labour’s relationship” with farmers.
Here are some pictures of the protest from Farmers Weekly.
McFadden says Farage’s opposition to deploying UK peacekeeping troops to Ukraine shows he’s taking ‘Kremlin line’
Yesterday Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, said that he would vote against any proposal to deploy British troops to Ukraine.
Speaking on LBC this morning, Pat McFadden, the work and pensions secretary, claimed this was fresh evidence of Reform UK being pro-Russian. He said:
It is in the British national interest that we do that [contribute British troops to a force boosting Ukraine’s security in the event of a peace deal]. That is why it is so concerning for me to see some politicians, like Mr Farage for example, immediately come out and parrot the Kremlin line and say that he wouldn’t support this. Perhaps it is no surprise he parrots the Kremlin line, because he does it quite a lot.
But this is someone who aspires to be the prime minister of the United Kingdom and that should give all of your listeners pause for thought. Can we trust someone who is so keen to parrot the Kremlin line with the future security of the United Kingdom? I certainly don’t think so and I think his statement yesterday will make a lot of other people reach the same conclusion.
How many children, and households, will benefit, region by region, by removal of two-child benefit cap
Labour has put out these figures, from the Department for Work and Pensions, showing how many children, and how many households, will benefit from the lifting of the two-child benefit cap region by region. The figures are from April 2025.
Starmer says Reform UK and Tories are in ‘cruel alliance’ to raise child poverty, as bill to get rid of two-child benefit cap unveiled
Good morning. Today is an important day for anti-poverty policy because the government is publishing its universal credit (removal of two-child limit) bill, the legislation that will implement the budget pledge to get rid of the Tory law that removed child-related UC benefit payments for third and subsequent children. The government says this will lift almost 500,000 children out of poverty – making this the biggest single anti child poverty measure implemented by a government in modern times.
Keir Starmer is on a visit this morning publicising the legislation. What is interesting about this is that, before the 2024 general election, Starmer was not just not committing to get rid of the cap; he was presenting that as evidence to voters that Labour would be tough on spending. In July 2023 he told Laura Kuenssberg he was “not changing that policy”. And, when challenged about this two days later at a conference with a leftwing audience, he said:
We keep saying collectively as a party that we have to make tough decisions. And in the abstract, everyone says: ‘That’s right Keir.’ But then we get into the tough decision – we’ve been in one of those for the last few days – and they say: ‘We don’t like that, can we just not make that one, I’m sure there is another tough decision somewhere else we can make.’ But we have to take the tough decisions.
Two and a half years later, the line is very different. Today Starmer will talk proudly about getting rid of the two-child benefit cap and use child poverty as an issue to attack Reform UK and the Tories. According to extracts released in advance, he will say:
Nigel Farage seems intent on linking arms with the Conservatives in a cruel alliance to push kids who need help back into poverty. This child poverty pact is something that should worry us all. These aren’t numbers on a spreadsheet – these are children’s life chances at stake.
Labour chooses the other road – lifting almost half a million kids out of child poverty – and that’s what we’re doing this year. It’s the right thing to do for them, their families and our economy. It’s astonishing that Reform and the Tories would undo that change and leave a lost generation of kids in every corner of Britain.
The Conservatives would bring back the two-child benefit cap in full, and Reform UK would bring it back for all families, apart from those with two parents working full-time. Labour analysis says this means just 3,700 of the 470,000 families affected by the cap would benefit from the Nigel Farage exemption.
At a press conference yesterday Farage offered a new argument (which has not been set out as formal Reform UK policy), suggesting benefits like this should only go to British-born people. As Jessica Elgot reports, Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, responded by suggesting this was immoral.
Getting rid of the two-child benefit cap will cost about £3bn. The Tories and Reform UK are both saying that, by gettting rid of benefit spending like this, they would free up money for tax cuts. But, in an interview this morning, Pat McFadden, the work and pensions secretary, argued that this £3bn was “an investment in children’s future”. He told Sky News:
We came into office with a manifesto commitment to reduce child poverty. We did it the last time we were in power. Child poverty has risen by about 900,000 since 2010.
I don’t see this just as a cash transfer in terms of that £3 billion, I see it as an investment in children’s future, because we know that children from the poorest families will end up doing less well at school, less than a quarter of them get five good GCSEs, we know they’re four times more likely to have mental health problems later in life.
Here is the agenda for the day.
9.35am: Emma Reynolds, the environment secretary, speaks at the Oxford Farming Conference. As Helena Horton reports, she will say smaller farms will be prioritised for nature funding.
10am: Tim Davie, the outgoing director general of the BBC, and interim chief executive Jonathan Munro give evidence to the Commons public accounts committee about the BBC World Service.
Morning: Keir Starmer and Bridget Philliipson, the education secretary, are on a visit in Bedfordshire linked to the publication of the bill getting rid of the two-child benefit cap.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
11.30am: Lilian Greenwood, the transport minister, gives a statement to MPs on the road safety strategy announced yesterday.
Late afternoon: Peers debate a motion tabled by Charlie Falconer saying they should agreed to speed up the debate on the assisted dying bill so that it can return to the Commons in “reasonable time”.
Also, at some point this afternoon (UK time), David Lammy, the deputy PM, is meeting JD Vance, the US vice president. But a press conference has not been scheduled, and it is not clear yet how much either of them will want to say about their conversation.
If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line when comments are open (normally between 10am and 3pm at the moment), or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.
If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. You can reach me on Bluesky at @andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social. The Guardian has given up posting from its official accounts on X, but individual Guardian journalists are there, I still have my account, and if you message me there at @AndrewSparrow, I will see it and respond if necessary.
I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.
