Scottish Government announces plans to abolish the two-child limit

In the 2025-2026 Scottish Budget speech, 4 December 2024, Shona Robinson Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government announced the Scottish Government’s aim to ‘effectively scrap’ the two-child limit from 2026-27 onwards.

What is the ‘two-child limit’?

In 2017 the Westminster Government implemented a policy that caps the amount of means tested benefits that a family can receive if they have three or more children. This policy affects families in receipt of Universal Credit and Tax Credits. Covering new births from April 2017, the two-child limit restricts means-tested financial support to the first two children only.

The draft 2025-26 budget announced a commitment by the Scottish Government to develop the systems necessary to effectively scrap the impact of the two-child benefit cap in 2026.

This new support could be worth over £3,500 per year to families hit by the cap and, once implemented, could help to lift 15,000 children out of poverty in Scotland and reduce the depth of poverty faced by many more.

The two-child limit currently affects Universal Credit and Tax Credit claimants all across the UK. The Child Poverty Action Group has estimated that there are almost 1.6 million children in 440,000 families affected by the policy. Abolishing the policy across the UK would lift 300,000 children out of poverty and mean 700,000 children are in less deep poverty, making a significant difference to the lives of over a million children.

Further information

For more information on the financial support your family may be entitled to please call our Family Benefits Advice Service on 028 9267 8200. Our trained advisors can help you to ensure that you are accessing all of the financial support to which you are entitled.