THE SNP has backed calls from a coalition of organisations urging the Labour Westminster government to scrap the two-child benefit cap.

The policy, which restricts universal credit and child tax credits to a family’s first two children, unless it can be proven any additional children are the result of rape, came into force in 2017 under the Tories.

The difference to families can be as much as £3,200 per child each year, a cost campaigners have argued is plunging almost half a million households below the poverty line. 

Last week, the Resolution Foundation’s Turning the Tide paper argued the Labour government’s “priority should be to abolish the two-child limit and the benefit cap” — a £3.6 billion measure it said “would take an estimated 500,000 children out of poverty in 2029-30.”

The call, echoed this week by the Child Poverty Action Group, has won the backing of the United Nations committee on economic, social & cultural rights.

The committee challenged Labour to “assess the impact of welfare reforms introduced since 2010 on the most disadvantaged groups and take corrective measures, including reversing policies such as the two-child limit.”

Despite a host of Labour frontbenchers decrying the cap in opposition, including Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, who branded it “obscene and inhumane,” the government has so far resisted calls to scrap the cap.

The SNP Scottish government has pledged to mitigate the policy by next year’s Holyrood elections.

But adding his voice to demands for it to be scrapped Britain-wide, SNP MSP Bob Doris said today: “The two-child cap is currently pushing 15,000 children across Scotland into poverty.

“That’s why this SNP government is progressing work to scrap it for good in the Budget passed last month with cross-party support in Holyrood, despite Labour MSPs refusing to back it.

“The Labour government once promised to do the same. However, since winning power last July they have broken that promise and have now adopted this cruel Tory policy as their own.”

A DWP spokesperson said: “No child should be in poverty, that’s why our ministerial taskforce is exploring all available levers across government to give every child the best start in life.

“We’re increasing the living wage, uprating benefits and supporting 700,000 of the poorest families with children by introducing a fair repayment rate on universal credit deductions to help low-income households and make everyone better off.”