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Birkenhead’s MP Frank Field today publishes new research
showing how £1 million is being snatched from some of the poorest children in
the Liverpool City Region.
In June, the High Court ruled that the Government was acting
unlawfully by imposing the Benefit Cap on single parents with children under
the age of two. The High Court decided that under the Government’s current
funding arrangements, those parents cannot reasonably be expected to find
suitable childcare which would enable them to work.
However, the Government’s appeal against the decision will
not be heard until next June – a year after the High Court delivered its
verdict. The Benefit Cap will continue to apply in its current form until
then.
Frank’s research shows that in this twelve-month period
between the initial verdict and the appeal, 400 families in the Liverpool City
Region will lose out on a combined total of £1,029,680 – an average cash loss
of £49 per family per week – which the High Court ruled they should
receive.
The Liverpool City Region Child Poverty and Life Chances
Commission, which Frank chairs, has written to the Lord Chief Justice asking
him urgently to bring forward the date of the Government’s appeal, to cut short
the period in which families have to go without money.
Commenting on the research, Frank says: ‘The Government is inflicting yet another year of
misery upon some of Merseyside’s poorest families. In the eyes of the law those
families should never even have been penalised by the Benefit Cap in the first
place. So this additional year in which families must somehow find an
additional £50 a week really is rubbing salt into the wound. It amounts to a
programme of state-sponsored destitution.
‘Justice demands
that the Government should pay the money to which the courts have ruled
families are entitled, at least until the appeal is heard.’
The data covering each local authority is as
follows:
Halton
23 families affected
Smallest cash loss - £2.99 per week
Largest cash loss - £126.50 per week
Average cash loss - £55.01 per week
Total loss to all families over the twelve-month
period = £65,791.96
Knowsley
78 families affected
Smallest cash loss - £0.01 per week
Largest cash loss - £149.50 per week
Average cash loss - £51.73 per week
Total loss to all families over the twelve-month
period - £209,816.88
Liverpool
138 families affected
Smallest cash loss - £1.26 per week
Largest cash loss - £149.50 per week
Average cash loss - £50.05 per week
Total loss to all families over the twelve-month
period - £359,158.80
St Helens
48 families affected
Smallest cash loss - £1.30 per week
Largest cash loss - £106.53 per week
Average cash loss - £41.84 per week
Total loss to all families over the twelve-month
period - £104,432.64
Sefton
35 families affected
Smallest cash loss - £0.58 per week
Largest cash loss - £109.01 per week
Average cash loss - £43.05 per week
Total loss to all families over the twelve-month
period - £78,351
Wirral
78 families affected
Smallest cash loss - £1.21 per week
Largest cash loss - £140.12 per week
Average cash loss - £52.30 per week
Total loss to all families over the twelve-month
period - £212,128.80