From potholes to Brexit: an at-a-glance guide to the budget
Philip Hammond set out his tax and spending plans - with more for road repairs than pupils
An extra 420m was made available immediately for local authorities to tackle potholes and other minor road works. The AA had asked for a 1bn pothole fund to fill in the craters that are costing motorists dear.
However, it was more than the 400m to help schools in England "buy the little extras they need", equivalent to 10,000 per primary school and 50,000 per secondary school. The Labour MP Jess Phillips criticised the chancellor's announcement that the money was spending on "kit". She tweeted: "Phil my kids school is talking about shutting early on Fridays because they can't staff it. It's not because they don't have footballs. FFS (the F is not fiscal)."
The government announced new projects will no longer be funded by the private finance initiative (PFI), whose reputation was further tarnished by the collapse of the construction group Carillion. Its successor - PF2 - will also be scrapped.
A new levy on non-recycled plastic packaging, meaning plastic with less than 30% recycled content will be taxed.
60m for planting trees.
The basic personal allowance, or the part of your income where there is no income tax paid, rises from 11,850 to 12,500. This is a year earlier than expected and fulfils a manifesto pledge. It is worth 130 a year to 26 million taxpayers in the 20% income tax band.
The starting point for 40% tax jumps to 50,00 from 46,350. That means an 860 gain for someone on 50,000, although increases to National Insurance peg the total gain back to 520.
The national living wage, for workers aged over 25, will increase from 7.83 per hour to 8.21 in April, a 4.9% rise.
Tobacco duty to rise with inflation plus 2%.
Duty on Beer, cider and spirits - a boost for pubs and the whisky industry respectively - to be frozen for the next year.
Wine did not get off as lightly and duty will rise in line with the retail price index.
Fuel duty frozen for ninth year in a row.
Tech firms, whose tax affairs are a regular lightning rod for criticism, are targeted with a new levy worth 400m per year. The digital services tax - to be imposed on search engines, social media platforms and online marketplaces - will be levied on UK-generated revenues of profitable firms with global revenues above 500m. So Facebook, Google and Amazon will all have to pay the tax.
The high street is helped out with a third taken off business rates for certain retail premises.
675m to create a "future high streets fund" that councils can access to redevelop their high streets.
Self-employed people who work for large and medium-sized companies will be affected by changes to rules around their tax status. They could be forced on the payroll if they work in the private sector.
The controversial welfare reform will receive 1bn extra over five years to help claimants cope with the transition to a new system.
There will also be payments for increased work allowances in universal credit, aimed at helping low-income working families, rising from 545m next year to 1.7bn per year by 2023/24.
A 2bn boost for mental health funding.
The NHS budget will increase by 20.5bn a year in real terms by 2023-24, as previously announced.
An extra 650m in social care funding for local authorities in England next year.
The independent body producing economic forecasts for the Treasury, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), predicted growth of 1.6% in 2019 (up from 1.2% in March forecasts), 1.4% in 2020 and 2021, 1.5% in 2022 and 1.6% in 2023.
The OBR predicted government borrowing of 31.8bn in 2019/20 (down from 33.9bn previously forecast), 26.7bn in 2020/21, 23.8bn in 2021/2, 20.8bn in 2022-23 and 19.8bn in 2023/24. It had previously forecast borrowing of 45.2bn borrowing this year and 21.4bn in 2022-23.
30bn to improve roads, including 25.3bn for the major roads network.
An additional 950m for the Scottish government between 2018 and 2021, with an extra 550m for the Welsh government over the same period and 320m for Northern Ireland.
In a bid to boost house construction, the government announced the removal of the borrowing cap on local authority housebuilding.
1bn for the Ministry of Defence this year and next for cyber-defence, anti-submarine capabilities and maintaining the pace of the Dreadnought submarine programme.
160m in extra funding for counter-terrorism policing by 2019-20.
2bn to be brought in over next five years by measures to tackle tax avoidance and evasion.
500m in extra departmental spending on preparations for Brexit, on top of the 2.2bn already announced, and the extra 1.5bn announced last year.
Continue reading...