Government may cap Child Benefit at two children
The work and pensions secretary wants to limit welfare to change the benefits culture.
Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, has said that he wants to limit Child Benefit to a maximum of two children in any family.
Currently, the welfare system pays Child Benefit and Child Tax Credits for every child in all families.
Mr Smith told the BBC that working families often decide against having more children for financial reasons. However, he believes some families on welfare have been "freed from" making that decision because of the current benefits system.
The work and pensions secretary needs to try and save an additional £10 billion. But critics say this move will not make significant savings for the Treasury and instead will penalise working families – especially those that fall on hard times.
Shadow work and pensions secretary Liam Byrne has called it "welfare chaos".
Child Benefit is already being withdrawn from all families with a higher-rate or additional-rate taxpayer from next April.
What do you think? Should all families have limits imposed on the benefits they receive? Vote in our poll below and let us know your thoughts in the Comments box below.
More on benefits
How to keep your Child Benefit
Benefit reform: all you need to know about the Universal Credit
Comments
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Very few parts of China still have the one child policy and with some horrible exceptions it is now often ignored. @The Bank Manager The scale of supposed 'scamming' by MP's is such a tiny amount of money in the grand scheme of things that it is getting very tiresome mentioning this every time national resources are debated. I'd be more concerned how many hundreds of millions people spend on stupid pets or that animal organisations can have a charity status if we are getting into the constructive detail of where money is wasted.
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How can one police childbirth? Does anyone have the right to state that one family with 2 children of differing ages, is acceptable, yet the family with three - whether they are 3 differing ages, a single age and twins or triplets - is wrong? As always, a broad-brush opinion is 100% inappropriate and the position should be that the family with 3 or more children should be individually means tested. Where should the funds come from to undertake the extra work - well how about all those MP's who scam my tax-paying Pounds for a start?
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We need to have children to grow up and be productive members of society to pay taxes to support young children, older and other people when they need to be supported. Taxpayers should not have to pay for huge families. I suggest 100% allowance for the first two children (the first is always the most expensive anyway), 80% for the 3rd child, 60% for the 4th child, 30% for the 5th and nothing for any more than five. Nothing in the UK stops people from having as many children as they wish, but when they get to 5, they should not expect taxpayers to contribute. They get NHS care and free education anyway.
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28 October 2012