Yesterday, Chancellor Rachel Reeves delivered her first budget, saying that it was a moment of “fundamental choice” for the UK.

In her speech, she noted that she is “deeply proud to be Britain’s first ever female Chancellor of the Exchequer”.

Inevitably there was a lot of criticising the Conservative party both at the outset and throughout her more than 90-minute speech in which she said that the government had “inherited a black hole in the public finances” and that public services were “on their knees”.

She went on to hammer businesses by a hike to Employers’ National Insurance. This had already been announced so came as no surprise, but the drop in the threshold to £5,000 in addition to the 1.2% rate increase from 13.8% to 15% is particularly punishing.

There wasn’t much by way of new incentives for businesses apart from a previous commitment to maintain full expensing and the £1m annual investment allowance.

As expected, Capital Gains Tax increases and closure of Inheritance Tax loopholes were announced as were increases to the ‘national living wage’.

In contrast to pre-budget predictions, the freeze on personal tax thresholds were not extended. Instead, Ms Reeves announced that from 2028 to 2029 the thresholds will be updated in line with inflation. That’s right, an increase in a woeful tax relief in four years, just ahead of an election…

One welcome announcement is that Reeves said there will no longer be biannual fiscal events.  Going forward the budget will only be in the Autumn, with no tax changes in the Spring Statement.

All in all, no real surprises and no real measures regarding pre-election promises re. economic productivity and growth. It is difficult to see how taxing business more rather than incentivising them to grow and prosper is going to improve our ailing economy.

You can find a full overview of the budget updates right here, and please get in touch with our expert team if you have any questions.