Keir Starmer calls Reform UK ‘shameful’ over two-child cap plan

The Prime Minister made the comments during a visit to south Wales on Wednesday(Image: PA)

Prime Minister Keir Starmer has said Reform UK is “shameful” after the party said it would reintroduce the two-child benefit cap. During a visit to south Wales on Wednesday the Prime Minister said the party would plunge thousands of children into poverty.

Labour reversed a Conservative policy but Reform UK’s would-be chancellor Robert Jenrick said earlier on Wednesday that the party would reintroduce it if it got into power.

The two-child benefit cap, which was introduced by the Conservative government in 2017, prevented parents from claiming child tax credit or universal credit for more than two children.

Families entitled to benefits who had had a third or subsequent child after April 6, 2017 were limited from receiving any extra support from the benefits system towards the cost of their child. Make sure you never miss Wales’ biggest updates by getting our daily newsletter.

The UK chancellor, Rachel Reeves, announced in the November 2025 budget that the two-child benefit cap would be scrapped in full starting from April 2026.

On Wednesday morning Mr Jenrick said: “As a signal of intent today Reform is changing our policy on the two-child cap for universal credit. The policy was well-meaning but right now we just cannot afford to do so with welfare. So it has to go.”

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Speaking on a visit to south Wales on Wednesday to announce plans to “transform” Wales’ railways with £14bn UK Government funding for seven new stations, which you can read about here, the Prime Minister called the Reform plans “shameful”.

He told WalesOnline: “I think it’s shameful because Reform’s decision to reverse on this means that if they ever got into power they would drag hundreds of thousands of children back into poverty.

“We tried that experiment under the Tory government and thousands – hundreds of thousands – of children grew up in poverty and their life chances are affected. And for Reform to say ‘we’re going to punish children back into poverty’ means they are destroying the life chances of those children.”

The Prime Minister added: “Everybody knows if you grow up in poverty it’s so much harder to get the job you need, to have the economic worth that you deserve, to go as far as your talent and ability will take you, because it holds children back.

“I’m really proud that this Labour government is lifting hundreds of thousands, half a million children, out of poverty with the action that we’re taking to give them the chance in life and so, this is shameful for Reform, a total disregard for the lives of young people and I hope that they absolutely never get to be in power, because this is an indication of the sort of Britain they want to see, a Britain which plunges people back into poverty.”

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