Boris Johnson has avoided a potentially humiliating showdown on cuts to universal credit — just weeks before the payments are reduced.
The Independent understands the Commons speaker has not accepted the rebel amendment put forward by Conservative MPs, including the former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith, calling for the £20-per-week uplift to be maintained.
The MPs had sought to use legislation on the annual uprating of pensions — being debated on Monday — to highlight the controversial issue in a Commons vote.
While a defeat would not have been binding on the government to abandon the cut, the rebels behind the move hoped it would have forced ministers to act.
Earlier, No 10 insisted the £20-per-week cut in universal credit would go ahead as planned — despite concerns over the increase in energy bills putting further pressure on low-income families across Britain.
The prime minister’s spokesperson said the uplift, which was introduced at the onset of the pandemic, was “always temporary” and had been designed to “help claimants through the economic shock and toughest period of the pandemic”.
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