A quarter of a million children live in a household where no one has ever worked according to stark new official figures.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said the number rose to 252,000 in the second quarter of this year, the highest level for 13 years.
It was up by 30,000 since the start of the year and 84,000 more than a year ago. The latest number represented 1.9 per cent, or nearly one in 50, of UK children.
The figures cover a period when Labour scrapped the two-child benefit cap, from April. That move further eased the financial pressure on parents on benefits thinking of having more children.
It was announced in November last year and the government said it meant all families could receive the child element of Universal Credit regardless of family size.
The latest figures for children in households that have never worked was the highest since the last quarter of 2013, when it stood at 262,000.
In the second quarter of 2024, when Labour came to power, the number stood at 232,000. A year later that figure had fallen sharply, to 168,000, but it subsequently began to climb again.
The ONS figures also showed that the number of households where no one is currently working stood at 3.16 million in the second quarter of this year – 8,000 down from the start of the year but 147,000 higher than a year earlier.
The latest figure represents 14.4 per cent, or one in seven, of households.
And the number of households where no one has ever worked stands at 347,000 or 1.6 per cent, the ONS revealed. That is up by 55,000 on last year.
The shocking figures paint a troubling picture of a large number of families where the idea of working for a living has never been known.
Helen Whately, the Conservative shadow work and pensions secretary, said: 'Under Labour, thousands more children are growing up in homes where nobody works.
'These are the worst figures for over a decade. These parents are living life on benefits and these children will grow up knowing no different.
'Labour has killed jobs and made it easier to get benefits. The taxpayer is footing the bill but children are also paying the price.'
Unemployment is expected to climb above 5 per cent later this year
It comes as the government grapples with the issue of youth joblessness, with recent figures showing the number of 16-24 year olds not in education, employment or training (NEETs) standing at nearly one million.
Meanwhile, overall unemployment is expected to climb above 5 per cent later this year as the economy struggles to pick up pace.
ONS figures last year revealed that in 2024, 53.3 per cent of people live in households receiving more in benefits - including welfare as well as the state pension and NHS - than they paid in taxes.
That equates to 35.8 million people, a record outside the pandemic. It underscores the significance of Labour's failure to push through welfare reform.
Those figures illustrate a grim trend as the proportion of the population dependent on benefits has steadily risen – from around 40 per cent in the 1980s to around 50 per cent at the time of the financial crisis in 2009.
It has barely fallen below that level since and spiked further to 55 per cent in 2020/21 during Covid – since then coming down a little but still remaining well above pre-pandemic levels.
Meanwhile, recent official jobs figures show Britain has been plunged into a 'jobs drought' under Labour as vacancies rose to a 12-year high.
The ONS said there were just 707,000 job openings in the three months to July. Excluding the pandemic, it was the lowest level since November 2014.
The figures published last month revealed that many firms have stopped hiring as they face ‘increases in labour costs and other operating expenses’.
That is likely to reflect the continuing impact of Labour’s £25 billion raid on employer national insurance as well as sharp rises in the minimum wage and surging energy costs. Firms are also worried about the impact of new workers’ rights rules spearheaded by Angela Rayner.
The headline figure for unemployment in the three months to June remained unchanged at 4.9 per cent, according to the ONS.
But the single month figure for June was 5.4 per cent, spiking sharply from 4.6 per cent the month before. It is up from 3.8 per cent just before Labour came to power. Unemployment has not been higher – on this measure – since 2015, excluding the pandemic.
It appears to tally with forecasts, including from the Bank of England, that the headline jobless rate will climb above 5 per cent later this year.
The ONS figures also revealed that the number of employees on UK payrolls fell by 13,000 in July. It is down by 94,000 over the past year and by 183,000 since June 2024, just before the general election.
Young people remain worst affected by jobs crisis with unemployment among 16-24 year olds at 16.2 per cent – representing 739,000 people.