SC, CB and 8 children, R. (on the application of) v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions & Ors [2021] UKSC 26 (9 July 2021)
Citation:SC, CB and 8 children, R. (on the application of) v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions & Ors [2021] UKSC 26 (9 July 2021).
Subjects invoked: 97. 'Social security'.
Rule of thumb:Does the new social security law not allowing parents to collect child benefits for the 3rd child they have & onwards in their family violate any human rights? No, the Court in this case held that the controversial new social security law of families only being entitled to monthly child tax credit/benefit payments for the first 2 children they have, and not children beyond this, was not a violation of human rights, and it was a law that was allowed to stand.
Background facts:
This case invoked the subject of social security.
The facts of this case were fairly straight-forward. The Government introduced a new law stating that every family would only receive child benefit payments for the first 2 children that they had, and no monthly payments for any children beyond this. The 10 children in this case challenged whether this was compliant with human rights.
The 10 children argued that this violated their human right not to be discriminated against, as children in other families with only 2 children got more money and a higher standard of life than them. They also argued that this meant that their quality of life would be damaged so much that their right not to be subject to degrading conditions was violated. The UK Government led evidence that the average family size in the UK was 2 children. They argued that the provided the family benefits for ordinary family circumstances, and they argued that if people wanted to extraordinarily large families above average then this was something that the UK Government could financially support, and was something that they had to do with their own finances - they therefore argued that it was perfectly fair that every ordinary-sized ‘family’ with children should receive the same amount of child-benefit, rather than this being done on a child-by-child basis. They further argued that this would not be overly detrimental to the children’s life. These families still would obtain enough money to live a reasonable standard of life, and, there were other funds they could apply to for money if they were struggling financially.
Judgment:
The Court upheld the arguments of the Government in this matter. They affirmed that as 2 children was the average size of family, it was within the Government’s discretion to offer ‘family benefits’ for ordinary family circumstances, rather than child benefits to people choosing to have extraordinarily large families, and this was not discriminatory. The Court also held that the human right not to be subject to degrading conditions was not violated. They affirmed that in order for the human right to not be subject to degrading conditions to be met, there had to be violence or a threat of violence, and there was no evidence of this. The Court affirmed that the case-law on this Article is clear about this being there, and it was not in this case.
Ratio-decidendi:
‘The assessment of proportionality, therefore, ultimately resolves itself into the question as to whether Parliament made the right judgment. That was at the time, and remains, a question of intense political controversy. It cannot be answered by any process of legal reasoning. There are no legal standards by which a court can decide where the balance should be struck between the interests of children and their parents in receiving support from the state, on the one hand, and the interests of the community as a whole in placing responsibility for the care of children upon their parents’, Lord Reed at 208
Warning: This is not professional legal advice. This is not professional legal education advice. Please obtain professional guidance before embarking on any legal course of action. This is just an interpretation of a Judgment by persons of legal insight & varying levels of legal specialism, experience & expertise. Please read the Judgment yourself and form your own interpretation of it with professional assistance.