More than 300,000 families in London and the South East will lose child benefit within weeks in an economic blow to the region.
The tax change, which will hit middle-class and wealthy households, is expected to drain at least £600 million out of the economy in this part of Britain in 2013/14. New figures reveal how many households in each constituency have been sent a letter warning them that their child benefit is to be cut next month.
London commuter constituencies will be the hardest hit. More households will be affected in just four of them — Richmond Park (5,720), Twickenham (4,860), Esher and Walton (4,950), and Wimbledon (3,980) — than in the whole of the North East (18,090).
In the capital as a whole, nearly as many families (132,730) will lose child benefit than in the whole of Scotland (51,410), Wales (20,630), the East Midlands (43,010) and the North East (18,090). Households with at least one earner on more than £60,000 will have all their child benefit axed — worth £1,750 for two children, and nearly £2,450 for three. Families with at least one parent on more than £50,000 but not above the £60,000 threshold, will see their child benefit tapered away.
“There is going to be a lot of pain ... and much of that pain will be felt by Londoners who are by no stretch of the imagination wealthy,” said Cities of London and Westminster MP Mark Field.
