Reeves is up. Live updates below:
- A massive budget.
- IFS says NI rise is straightforward breach as working people will pay for it.
- Labour has no experience of business and enterprise.
- Business confidence plummeting as Labour’s plans became known. French-style labour laws will impose £5 billion cost on businesses by their own assessment.
- She scrapped plan to get civil service down to pre-pandemic levels.
- Reeves has failed to grip public spending.
- Borrowing higher in every year of forecast. Debt higher in every year of forecast. She tries to cover up splurge by fiddling rules. New measure won’t be a constraint on amount she can borrow. It will allow for significantly more borrowing without any need for tougher choices elsewhere.
- Budget does not balance the books as promised. Chancellor launched enormous borrowing spree.
- Stop blaming everyone else and take responsibility.
- “I will take no lectures from those two about difficult decisions.”
- Claims of inheritance are nonsense. Inflation was at target. Mortgage rates were cut. UK was fastest growing advanced economy in the world.
- OBR has declined to back up claims of a fictional black hole. Appears nowhere in their report. Deeply disappointed that OBR has been politicised.
- They have raised tax to record levels. They have broken promises and working people will pay the price.
- Fiscal rules fiddled, pay rise deals for unions, britain’s poorest pensioners squeezed, welfare spending out of control, spree of tax rises. NI up, CGT up, IHT up, energy taxes up, etc etc.
- Time and again Tories warned they would tax spend and borrow. Labour always denied such plans. “Proof that they planned to do this all along.”
- PM said he wanted to restore trust: his actions speak for themselves. Broken promise after broken promise.
- Sunak up.
- 77-minute budget.
- Fixing the foundations guff to finish off.
- Reeves finishing up by asking Tories to produce alternative.
- £22.6 billion increase in day to day health budget. NHS capital budget up £3.1. billion.
- 19% increase in DfE budget. £6.7 billion capital investment.
- GB Energy.
- Funding for 11 new green hydrogen projects.
- Funding for tunneling HS2 to Euston.
- Hiring round for planning officers.
- Right to buy discounts reduced. Local authorities take receipts themselves.
- National Wealth Fund. Raft of borrowing. £5 billion housing, £1 billion into aerospace, £2 billion into automotive sector, £520 million for life sciences, £650 million into local transport.
- New target means £15.7 billion of headroom.
- Public debt defined as net financial debt: PSNFL.
- Funding for devolved governments.
- Shoplifting: effective immunity for low-value shoplifting scrapped. More funding to crack down on organised gangs targeting retailers.
- £1.3 billion of additional grant funding to councils with at least £600 million for social care.
- Funding to commemorate VE and VJ day next year.
- Defence 2.5% path to be set out in future. Total increase to MoD budget £2.9 billion from next year.
- Special education needs. £1 billion uplift in funding, 6% real terms increase.
- Core schools budget up £2.3 billion next year.
- Late spring next phase of spending review. Day to day spending will grow by 1.5% in real terms.
- Income tax threshold freeze will not be extended beyond 2028. Always time to freeze it again…
- VAT on private school fees from January 2025. Business rates relief from April will be removed.
- Energy profits levy on oil and gas up to 38% which will expire in March 2030. 100% first year allowances and decarbonisation allowances maintained.
- SDLT surcharge for second homes up 2% to 5%. Comes into effect from tomorrow.
- Carried interest capital gains to 32% from April 2025 and changes to rules by year after.
- Non-dom regime: Concept of domicile removed from April 2025. New residence scheme to come into place. Extension of temporary repatration relief to 3 years. OBR says this will raise £12 billion over next 5 years.
- Corporation tax capped for duration of parliament. Full expensing maintained.
- Alcohol duty rates on non-draught to increase along with RPI next year. Draught duty cut by 1.7%.
- 40% relief on business rates for retail hospitality and leisure industry up to £110,000 per business. Small business tax multiplier to freeze next year.
- Air passenger duty: Private jets duty increased by further 50% to £450 per passenger for private jet. Jibe about California…
- Tobacco duty escalator maintained. Extra 10% on handrolled tobacco. Vape liquid flat rate from 2026 October. One-off increase in tobacco duty. Sugary drinks levy.
- Inheritance Tax: Freeze on thresholds extended 2 years to 2030. Inherited pensions into IHT from April 2027. Agricultural and business property relief reformed – First £1 million is relieved, for assets over IHT will apply with 50% relief at effective rate of 20%. 50% relief applied to IHT for shares on AIM market. £2 billion by end of forecast.
- Capital Gains Tax: Lower rate increased from 10% to 18% and higher from 20% to 24% and maintaining rates on residential property. Retention of lifetime limit of business asset disposal relief, 10% this year and up to 18% from 2026.
- Allowance for small companies from £5,000 to £10,500.
- Impacts will be “beyond businesses too” she admits.
- Employers NI up 1.2% to 15% from April. Reduction in secondary threshold from £9,100 to £5,000. £25 billion per year by end of decade.
- Tory tax cuts weren’t honest. Manifesto pledges to remain, she says.
- Fuel duty: to freeze duty again would cost £3 billion next year. Increasing fuel duty would be wrong choice. Frozen again.
- State pension uprated.
- Reducing level of debt repayments, to be taken from 25% to 15% of standard universal credit allowance.
- £1 billion to extend household support fund and discretionary housing payments.
- Carer’s Allowance. Now up to 16 hours of national living wage per week.
- Minimum wage up 6.7% to £12.21 per hour. Single adult rate phased in over time, 18-20 wage increased by 16.3% to £10 per hour.
- Modernisation of HMRC systems and additional debt and compliance staff. Ensure on-time payments and attack tax avoidance scheme. £6.5 billion pounds to be raised by end of decade.
- Current Budget In Surplus In 2027/28.
- Welfare: savings to work capability assessment, new crackdown on welfare fraud – expansion of DWP counter-fraud teams with new methods. New legal powers including direct access to bank accounts – to save £4.2 billion per year by end of decade. Get Britain Working white paper to tackle “root causes” of inactivity – £240 million for 16 projects to target economically inactive.
- David Goldstone appointed chairman of new Office of Value for Money.
- £5.5 billion of savings this year. Savings target for departments set. Covid Corruption Commissioner to be appointed to claw back cash.
- Borrowing to fall to £72.2 billion in 27/8, £70.6 billion in 2029/30.
- OBR confirmed that borrowing in this year is £127 billion. Increase in next cash requirement is lower than increase in borrowing.
- OBR says GDP up 1.1% in 2024, 2% in 2025. 1.6% by 2029.
- Forecast: CPI inflation will average 2.5% this year, 2.6% in 2025, 2.3% in 2026, 2.1% in 2027, 2.1% in 2028, 2% in 2029.
- Reeves confirms taxes up by £40 billion. A record…
- Drops that she was an economist at the Bank of England. No mention of HBOS…
- Jibe at Tories for leadership race.
- Infected blood scandal: no budget for costs of compensation from Tories. Reeves says specific funding will be set out. £11.8 billion, £1.8 billion for Horizon Scandal.
- Ghani tells MPs to shut up.
- Since 2021 there had been no detailed plans for departmental spending going past this year and they didn’t take into account the black hole.
- Says services are in ruins. Tories had “no plan” to fix problems.
- 10 recommendations of OBR review will be implemented.
- OBR apparently says previous government didn’t provide all information available when producing Spring Budget forecast – it would have been “materially different.” Reeves says any comparison with the March forecast and now is “false” in that case…
- Says government is publishing a line-by-line breakdown of £22 billion “black hole” which shows “hundreds of unfunded pressures.“
- Congratulates herself on being a woman.
- Just like before Labour has to rebuild Britain again.
- “Invest, invest, invest” is only way to drive economic growth.
- Reeves starts. “On July 4th the country voted for change.”
- Ghani ticks off Labour for using previous Tory briefing tactics as an excuse for their own.
- Deputy Speaker Nus Ghani kicks off. And attacks Reeves for pre-budget briefings again…
