Financial Statement

Ian C. Lucas Excerpts

Wednesday 8th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr Philip Hammond)]

I report today on an economy that has continued to confound the commentators with robust growth, a labour market delivering record employment and a deficit down by over two thirds. As we start our negotiations to exit the European Union, this Budget takes forward our plan to prepare Britain for a brighter future. It provides a strong and stable platform for those negotiations; it extends opportunity to all our young people; it delivers further investment in our public services; and it continues the task of getting Britain back to living within its means. We are building the foundations of a stronger, fairer, more global Britain.

As the House knows, this will be the last spring Budget. The Treasury has helpfully reminded me that I am not the first Chancellor to announce the “last spring Budget”. Twenty-four years ago Norman Lamont also presented what was billed then as “the last spring Budget”. He reported on an economy that was growing faster than any other in the G7, and he committed to continued restraint in public spending. The then Prime Minister described it as the

“right Budget, at the right time, from the right Chancellor”.

What the Treasury failed to remind me was that 10 weeks later the Chancellor was sacked. So, wish me luck today!

Last year, the British economy grew faster than the United States, faster than Japan and faster than France. Indeed, among the major advanced economies Britain’s economic growth in 2016 was second only to Germany. Employment is at a record high; unemployment is at an 11-year low, with over 2.7 million more people enjoying the security and dignity of work than in 2010—a very far cry from the 3 million unemployed predicted by the Labour party. I am pleased to report, on International Women’s Day, that there is now a higher proportion of women in the workforce than ever before. I am even more pleased to report that, as my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has remarked, since 23 February there is a higher proportion of women in work in the parliamentary Conservative party.

But, Mr Deputy Speaker, there is no room for complacency, and you will not find any on these Benches. As we prepare for our future outside the EU, we cannot rest on our past achievements. We must focus relentlessly on keeping Britain at the cutting edge of the global economy. The deficit is down, but debt is still too high. Employment is up, but productivity remains stubbornly low. Too many of our young people are leaving formal education without the skills they need for today’s labour market, and too many families are still feeling the squeeze, almost a decade after the crash. So our job is not done, and our task today is to take the next steps in preparing Britain for a global future—to equip our young people with the skills they need, to support our public services and to help ordinary working families as we build an economy that works for everyone.

I thank the Office for Budget Responsibility under Robert Chote for its report received today. Let me also take this opportunity to thank my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary and my ministerial team, who really are the unsung heroes of the Budget, doing much of the heavy lifting over the last few weeks, and of course my excellent Parliamentary Private Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen).

I turn now, Mr Deputy Speaker, to the OBR forecasts. This is the spreadsheet bit, but bear with me because I have a reputation to defend. The OBR forecasts the level of gross domestic product in 2021 to be broadly the same as at autumn statement. However, the path by which we get there has changed. Reflecting the recent strength in the economy, the OBR has upgraded its forecast for growth next year from 1.4% to 2%, and I do not see too many people on the Opposition Front Bench indicating flatlining. In 2018-19, growth is forecast to slow to 1.6%, before picking up to 1.7%, then 1.9% and returning to 2% in 2021.

Resilience in the economy is reflected in a strong labour market. Since 2010, the employment rate has risen from 70.2% to 74.6%, with positive news for all parts of the United Kingdom. Unemployment has fallen fastest in Yorkshire and the Humber, and Wales; wages have grown fastest in Northern Ireland; and productivity has grown fastest in Scotland and in the north-east. This positive trend is set to continue over the forecast period. The number of people in employment is set to grow in every year, with a further two thirds of a million people in work by 2021. The OBR forecasts inflation at 2.4% this year, then 2.3% next year and 2% in 2019. Most importantly, despite higher than target inflation, real wages continue to rise in every year of the forecast.

While the economic forecasts are broadly unchanged since the autumn, the OBR has substantially revised down its short-term forecast of public sector net borrowing. The OBR attributes this change to a number of one-off factors that it does not expect to lead to a structural improvement over the forecast period. Combining these factors with the higher short-term forecast for growth and taking into account the measures that I shall announce today, the OBR now forecasts borrowing in 2016-17 to be £16.4 billion lower than forecast in the autumn at £51.7 billion, then £58.3 billion in 2017-18, £40.8 billion in 2018-19, £21.4 billion, £20.6 billion and, finally, £16.8 billion in 2021-22—all lower than forecast at autumn statement.

Overall, public sector net borrowing as a percentage of GDP is predicted to fall from 3.8% last year to 2.6% this year. For those who care about such things, it means we are forecast to meet our 3% EU stability and growth pact target this year for the first time in almost a decade, but I will not hold my breath for my congratulatory letter from Jean-Claude Juncker. Borrowing is then forecast to be 2.9% in 2017-18, and then to fall over the remainder of the Parliament to 1.9% in 2018-19, then 1% and 0.9%, before reaching 0.7% of GDP in 2021-22, its lowest level in two decades.

The OBR expects cyclically adjusted public sector net borrowing to be 0.9% in 2020-21, giving us £26 billion of headroom against the headline 2% target in our new fiscal rules, maintaining our fiscal resilience over the period. The OBR’s forecast of lower near-term borrowing, coupled with recent strength in the economy, means lower debt across the period. The OBR now forecasts that debt will rise to 86.6% this year, before peaking at 88.8% next year, 1.4 percentage points lower than forecast in the autumn. It then falls in 2018-19—for the first time since 2001-02—to 88.5%, and continues to decline to 86.9% in 2019-20, 83% in 2020-21 and then reaches 79.8% in 2021-22.

At the autumn statement, I set out our plan to return the public finances to balance in the next Parliament—a plan that is now underpinned by our new fiscal rules. That plan strikes the right balance between reducing our deficit, preserving fiscal flexibility and investing in Britain’s future. Some have argued that lower borrowing this year makes a case for more unfunded spending in the future. I disagree. Britain has a debt of nearly £1.7 trillion—almost £62,000 for every household in the country. Each year, we are spending £50 billion on debt interest—more than we spend on defence and policing combined. Borrowing over the forecast period is still set to be £100 billion higher than predicted at Budget 2016.

So the only responsible course of action is to continue with our plan, undeterred by any short-term fluctuations and undistracted—[Interruption.]—by the reckless policies advanced by the Opposition. We on this side of the House will not saddle our children with ever-increasing debts. [Interruption.] Mr Deputy Speaker, I think Opposition Members may need to have a word with their own Front Benchers, who propose borrowing another half a trillion pounds with which to saddle our children and burden their futures. So the Budget that I set out today will again fund all additional spending decisions over the forecast period.

A strong economy needs a fair, stable and competitive tax system, creating the growth that will underpin our future prosperity. My ambition is for the UK to be the best place in the world to start and grow a business. Under the last Labour Government, corporation tax was 28%. By the way, they don’t call it the “last” Labour Government for nothing. From April this year, corporation tax will fall to 19%, the lowest rate in the G20. In 2020, it will fall again to 17%, sending the clearest possible signal that Britain is open for business.

I am listening to the voice of business.

[Ian C. Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

Resign!

[Mr Hammond]

The one place where I will not hear the voice of business is on the Opposition Benches.

I committed at the autumn statement to review, with business, our R and D tax credit regime. We have done so and concluded that it is globally competitive. But to make the UK even more attractive for R and D, we have accepted industry calls for a reduction in administrative burdens around the scheme and will shortly bring forward measures to deliver that.

In a digital age, it is right that we develop a digital tax system, but in response to concerns about the timetable expressed by business organisations and by several of my right hon. Friends, including the Chairman of the Treasury Committee, I have decided that for businesses with turnover below the VAT registration threshold I will delay by one year the introduction of quarterly reporting, at a cost to the Exchequer of £280 million.

I have heard, too, the calls by North sea oil and gas producers and the Scottish Government to provide further support for the transfer of late-life assets. As UK oil and gas production declines, it is essential that we maximise the exploitation of remaining reserves, so we will publish a formal discussion paper on the options in due course.

There is one further area in which I can announce action to back British businesses. My right hon. Friend the Communities and Local Government Secretary and I have listened to the concerns raised by colleagues in this House and by businesses about the effects of the 2017 business rates revaluation. Business rates raise £25 billion per year, all of which, by 2020, will be going to fund local government, so we cannot abolish them, as some have suggested; but it is certainly true in the medium term that we have to find a better way of taxing the digital part of the economy—the part that does not use bricks and mortar. In the meantime, there is scope to reform the revaluation process, making it smoother and more frequent to avoid the dramatic increases that the present system can deliver. We will set out our preferred approach in due course and will consult on it before the next revaluation is due.

The revaluation itself is by law fiscally neutral. Ahead of this revaluation, the Government committed to a package of cuts to business rates now worth nearly £9 billion, permanently doubling the rate of small business rate relief to 100%, and raising the thresholds so that 600,000 small businesses are taken out of paying rates altogether. The revaluation has undoubtedly raised some hard cases, especially for those businesses coming out of small business rates relief, so today, as I promised many of my right hon. Friends, I address those concerns with three measures which apply to the national business rates system for England. First, any business coming out of small business rate relief will benefit from an additional cap. No business losing small business rate relief will see their bill increase next year by more than £50 a month, and the subsequent increases will be capped at either the transitional relief cap or £50 a month, whichever is higher.

Secondly, recognising the valuable role that local pubs play in our communities, I will provide a £1,000 discount on business rates bills in 2017 for all pubs with a rateable value of less than £100,000—that is 90% of all pubs in England. Thirdly, on top of these two measures, I will provide local authorities with a £300 million fund to deliver discretionary relief to target individual hard cases in their local areas. This fund will be allocated to local authorities by formula, and my right hon. Friend the Communities and Local Government Secretary will set out details in due course. Taken together, this is a further £435 million cut in business rates, targeted at those small businesses facing the biggest increases, protecting our pubs, and giving local authorities the resource to respond flexibly to local circumstances.

Just as a strong economy requires a tax system that is competitive, a strong society requires one that is fair; and because I have committed to funding my spending decisions in this Budget rather than borrowing more, I make no apology for raising additional revenues and for doing so in ways which enhance the fairness of the system. First and foremost, that means collecting the taxes that are due. Since 2010, we have secured £140 billion in additional tax revenue by taking robust action to tackle avoidance, evasion, and non-compliance.

These actions have helped the UK achieve one of the lowest tax gaps in the world, but there is more that we can do. In this Budget, we set out further actions to stop businesses converting capital losses into trading losses; to tackle abuse of foreign pension schemes; and to introduce UK VAT on roaming telecoms outside the EU, in line with international standard practice. From July, we will introduce a tough new financial penalty for professionals who enable a tax avoidance arrangement that is later defeated by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. Taken together, these measures will raise £820 million over the forecast period.

As well as collecting taxes that are due, a fair system ensures that those with the broadest shoulders bear the heaviest burden. As a result of the changes we have made since 2010, the top 1% of income tax payers now pay 27% of all income tax, a higher proportion than in any year under the last Labour Government. But a fair system will also ensure fairness between individuals, so that people doing similar work for similar wages and enjoying similar state benefits pay similar levels of tax. As our economy responds to the challenges of globalisation, shifts in demographics, and the emergence of new technologies, we have seen a dramatic increase in the number of people working as self-employed or through their own companies. Indeed, many of our most highly paid professionals work through limited liability partnerships and are treated as self-employed. There are many good reasons for choosing to be self-employed or for working through a company—indeed, I have done both in my time—and I will always encourage and support the entrepreneurs and the innovators who are the lifeblood of our economy.

People should have choices about how they work, but those choices should not be driven primarily by differences in tax treatment. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has asked Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the RSA—the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce—to consider the wider implications of different employment practices. I look forward to his final report in the summer, and am grateful to him for sharing his preliminary thoughts. He is clear that differences in tax treatment are a key driver behind the trends we are observing—a conclusion shared by the Institute for Fiscal Studies and the Resolution Foundation.

An employee earning £32,000 will incur, between him and his employer, £6,170 of national insurance contributions. A self-employed person earning the equivalent amount will pay just £2,300—significantly less than half as much. Historically, the differences in NICs between those in employment and the self-employed reflected differences in state pension entitlement and contributory welfare benefits, but with the introduction of the new state pension last year, these differences have been very substantially reduced. Self-employed workers now build up the same entitlement to the state pension as employees—a big pension boost to the self-employed.

The most significant remaining area of difference is in relation to parental benefits, and I can announce today that we will consult in the summer on options to address the disparities in this area, as the Federation of Small Businesses and others have proposed. The difference in national insurance contributions is no longer justified by the difference in benefit entitlements. Such dramatically different treatment of two people earning essentially the same undermines the fairness of the tax system. Employed and self-employed alike use our public services in the same way, but they are not paying for them in the same way. The lower national insurance paid by the self-employed is forecast to cost our public finances over £5 billion this year alone. This is not fair to the 85% of workers who are employees.

The abolition of class 2 NICs for self-employed people announced by my right hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Mr Osborne) in 2016 and due to take effect in 2018 would further increase the gap between employment and self-employment. To be able to support our public services in this Budget, and to improve the fairness of the tax system, I will act to reduce the gap to better reflect the current differences in state benefits. I have considered the possibility of simply reversing the decision to abolish class 2 contributions, but the class 2 NIC is regressive and outdated—it is absolutely right that it should go—so, instead, from April 2018, when the class 2 NIC is abolished, the main rate of class 4 NICs for the self-employed will increase by 1% to 10%, with a further 1% increase in April 2019.

The combination of the abolition of class 2 and the class 4 increases I have announced today raises a net £145 million a year for our public services by 2021-22. That is an average of around 60p a week per self-employed person in this country. Since class 2 contributions are payable at a flat rate while class 4 is chargeable as a proportion of profits, all self-employed people earning less than £16,250 will still see a reduction in their total NICs bill. This change reduces the unfairness in the NICs system and reflects more accurately the current differences in benefits available from the state.

Alongside the gap between employees and the self-employed, there is a parallel unfairness in the treatment of those working through their own companies. Britain has the most competitive corporate tax regime in the G7, and we are determined to make Britain the most attractive place to start and grow a business, but to do that, we must ensure that our corporate tax regime does not encourage people across the economy to form companies simply to reduce tax liabilities, pushing the burden of financing our public services on to others.

HMRC estimates that existing incorporations cost the public finances over £6 billion a year, and the OBR forecasts that at the current rate of increase, an additional annual cost to the Exchequer will occur from those choosing to incorporate of £3.5 billion a year by 2021-22. The gap in total tax and NICs between an employed worker and one who has set up his own company will normally be greater even than the gap with the self-employed, and there are several perfectly legal ways in which that gap can be made bigger still. This is not fair, and it is not affordable. Fairness demands that this discrepancy in treatment be addressed, just as I have addressed the discrepancy with the self-employed.

The dividend allowance has increased the tax advantage of incorporation. It allows each director/shareholder to take £5,000 of dividends out of their company tax-free, over and above the personal allowance. It is also an extremely generous tax break for investors with substantial share portfolios. I have decided to address the unfairness around director/shareholders’ tax advantage, and at the same time raise some much-needed revenue to fund the measures I shall announce today, by reducing the tax-free dividend allowance from £5,000 to £2,000 with effect from April 2018. About half the people affected by this measure are director/shareholders of private companies. The rest are investors in shares with holdings typically worth over £50,000 outside individual savings accounts. Of course, everyone will benefit from the generous £4,760 increase in the annual ISA allowance to £20,000, and the further increase in the personal allowance to £11,500 from April.

I now turn to duties and levies. Unusually for a Chancellor, I am delighted to announce a reduction in the expected yield of a tax—the soft drinks levy. I can confirm today the final rates of 18p and 24p per litre for the main and higher bands respectively, but producers are already reformulating sugar out of their drinks, which means a lower revenue forecast for this tax. This is good news for our children. In further good news for them today, I can confirm that we will none the less fund the Department for Education with the full £1 billion that we originally expected from the levy this Parliament, to invest in school sports and healthy living programmes.

I am freezing for another year both the vehicle excise duty rates for hauliers and the heavy goods vehicle road user levy. I am introducing a new minimum excise duty on cigarettes, based on a pack price of £7.35, and I can also confirm that I will make no changes to previously planned upratings of duties on alcohol and tobacco. The tax measures I have announced enhance the sustainability of our public services into the future and, by improving the fairness of the system, help us to keep tax rates low.

Economic policy does not exist in a vacuum, and economic growth is a means, not an end in itself. The objective of our economic policy is to support ordinary working families and to build an economy that works for them. Government Members know that we can achieve rising living standards and deliver investment in our vital public services only if we have a strong economy and sustainable public finances. It is a simple proposition, yet one that Opposition Front-Benchers seem to find strangely difficult to understand.

We start from a strong base: real wages have grown for 27 straight months; the wages of the lowest-paid grew faster last year than in any of the previous 20 years; and the poorest households have seen their labour incomes rise more since 2010 in the UK than in any other country in the G7. Last year, we delivered a pay rise to over a million of the lowest-paid through the national living wage, and next month we take more steps to support working families with the cost of living. The national living wage will rise again to £7.50 in April, which is over £500 more for a full-time worker than this year and £1,400 more than when the national living wage was introduced. The personal allowance will rise for the seventh year in a row to £11,500, and the higher rate threshold to £45,000; 29 million people will be better off, with a typical basic rate taxpayer paying £1,000 less than in 2010. We will meet our manifesto commitment to increasing the thresholds to £12,500 and £50,000 respectively by the end of this Parliament.

I can also confirm today that the new National Savings and Investments bond that I announced in the autumn statement will be available from April, and will pay 2.2% on deposits up to £3,000—a welcome break for hard-pressed savers. The universal credit taper rate will be reduced in April from 65% to 63%, cutting tax for 3 million families on low incomes.

Next month, we will see the introduction of our flagship tax-free childcare policy, which will allow working families across the UK to receive up to £2,000 a year towards the cost of childcare for each child under 12. The scheme will be rolled out to all eligible parents by the end of the year, and in addition, from September, working parents with three and four-year-olds will get their free childcare entitlement doubled to 30 hours a week. That is worth around £5,000 a year to a young family with a three-year-old and both parents working. By the end of this Parliament, this Government will be spending on childcare £6 billion a year.

These childcare measures represent a further huge step forward in support for ordinary working families, and for women in the workplace. I am delighted to use the occasion of International Women’s Day to announce three additional measures—well, not quite announce them, because my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has already announced two of them.