Beware the Ides of March - UK Budget Day 15th March 2023 - What do you expect and want to see ???

[lol-lol]

29 minutes ago, Rooted said:

No need for a whole new thread pre 2023 Autumn Budget Announcement which is being held as near to Winter as they get.

 

Guesses and wants are just that till the thin man stands and tries to give tweeks and financial bribes and promises to what they hope are people who will vote for the Conservatives & Unionists or give donations for services rendered by the Chancellor. 

 

Labour man said no money in 2010 as UK was a trillion pounds in debt.

 

UK now 3 trillion pounds in debt and UK government has way less than no money.

 

Chancellors already reversed 1.5% ni levy and raised annual pension ceiling from 40k to 60k so well off already quids in.

 

Like to see an inflationary hike in fuel duty to start refilling coffers but insurance tax to go down by at least a third as that is a rip off.

 

Edited 18 November, 2023 by lol-lol

[lol-lol]

Not many Autumn Statement Predictions as Chancellor has less than No Money but This is Money has some projections.....

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/bills/article-12761391/Autumn-Statement-2023-predictions-inheritance-tax-pensions-stamp-duty-heres-expect-Jeremy-Hunt.html

Some elements of their predictions and points they rightly feel need addressing.........

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Stealth tax 

Hunt is under pressure from his own party to slash taxes but there are, as yet, no plans to do so.  He is not expected to make any big changes to tax policy next week, but millions of Britons still face having to pay more. Hunt imposed a six-year freeze on personal allowances and thresholds, meaning more people are being dragged into a higher tax bracket.  This is what is known as fiscal drag, and a record number will find some of their earnings fall within the higher 40 per cent income tax.   It also means that millions of lower earners will have to start paying income tax because the personal allowance - the level at which they begin to pay tax - is stuck at £12,570.  The Office for Budget Responsibility, which assesses the Government's economic plans, estimates that freezing thresholds until 2028 will create an additional 3.2million new taxpayers.  It says 2.6million more people will pay higher rate tax.

Pensions

Under the triple lock rules, the state pension should increase every year by the highest of inflation, average earnings growth or 2.5 per cent.  Pensioners should be getting an 8.5 per cent boost to their state pension next year, but there are concerns the Treasury could tinker with the figure.  Last April, the triple lock was honoured and the state pension rose 10.1 per cent in line with the inflation rate.  But the Government suspended the earnings element from the state pension rise in April 2022, because wage growth was temporarily distorted to more than 8 per cent due to the pandemic, and pensioners got a 3.1 per cent rise instead.  There is speculation it might say NHS bonuses have skewed the figure this time, and do something similar for the second time in three years.  This would see the state pension rise by 7.8 per cent instead........

 

Savings

There have been calls to end the freeze on the personal savings allowance, which has been set at the same level since 2016 and not been adjusted to reflect inflation and rising interesting.  A million more people are set to pay tax on cash savings interest this year, according to AJ Bell.  'Tax bills are paid either through self-assessment or deducted from income through a tax code adjustment,' said Laura Suter, AJ Bell's head of personal finance.  'Many won't be aware they owe the tax until HMRC sends them a letter to change their tax code to deduct the money from their payslip.   'It shouldn't be the case that ordinary savers are caught up in tax complexity for doing the responsible thing and building a savings pot.  'Doubling the personal savings allowance would mean that £20,000 held in a 5 per cent savings account would not be taxed for basic and higher rate taxpayers, ending the penalty on those who have rainy day savings.'

Mortgages and first-time buyers

The Chancellor could unveil a package of support for first-time buyers by extending the mortgage guarantee scheme, according to The Times.  The scheme, which helps first-time buyers borrow with a 5 per cent deposit, was first introduced in 2021 and is set to end in December. It could be extended for another year.  Homebuyers could also reportedly see an increase to stamp duty thresholds. The point at which people start paying stamp duty is currently set at 5 per cent of the value of a property over £250,000, increasing to 10 per cent over £925,000.

 

Insurance Premium Tax

The Association of British Insurers has called on the Government to reduce the rate of Insurance Premium Tax to help manage rising costs. IPT is a tax on general insurance premiums and for most policies, it is charged at 12 per cent. The tax is levied onto insurers, who then typically pass the bulk of the cost onto those taking out a policy.  The ABI said that for motor and home insurance alone, IPT now typically equates to £98 a year.  > You're now paying £264 a year in insurance tax as the Treasury rakes in £7.45bn, warns LEE BOYCE   Mervyn Skeet, the ABI's director of general insurance policy said: 'Insurers are doing all they can to offer competitively priced insurance, despite facing some substantial increases in costs outside of their control.   'Now has never been a better time for the government to show its support to the millions of homeowners and businesses who do the right thing by protecting their families and livelihoods against sudden financial shocks, than to reduce Insurance Premium Tax.'

 

[@Lee]

Reducing taxes isn't going to get people to see doctors more quickly, or bring waiting times down. It's not going to put more police on the beat or more more HO jobs to deal with asylum applications. 

It's not going to help schools with RAAC problems or give them more teachers and it's certainly not going to build forty new hospitals. 

Reducing taxes, by definition, prevents all that because, well, because you've cut the funding for them by reducing taxes.

Sounds lovely though doesn't it. 

[lol-lol]

1 hour ago, @Lee said:

Reducing taxes isn't going to get people to see doctors more quickly, or bring waiting times down. It's not going to put more police on the beat or more more HO jobs to deal with asylum applications. 

It's not going to help schools with RAAC problems or give them more teachers and it's certainly not going to build forty new hospitals. 

Reducing taxes, by definition, prevents all that because, well, because you've cut the funding for them by reducing taxes.

Sounds lovely though doesn't it. 

 

I think the Con government thinking might be that if you pay less taxes some people could afford to go private for medical needs and schooling of their children.

If one cannot afford to go private then one must wait and 65 weeks is when waiting for an operation becomes "too long" and if one is still alive then one might eventually get that operation done on the NHS.

 

Its personal choice ie afford to get the premium service if one can or get that worsen service for those who do not have the means to go private.  I expect the huge number of migrants will be blamed for the over burdening of the NHS, Schools etc rather than the massive drop in investment in real terms.

 

Charity begins at home. Yet still we are taxed more than any time since WW2 ie nearly half of average income going in direct or indirect taxes.

 

 

[@Lee]

Can anyone think of any national assets left to sell that Thatcher didn't already sell off 🤷 

Britain needs to renationalise not sell off more for a quick buck and a few votes like this tory dinosaur suggests. 

 

[@Lee]

Without doubt the NHS is in the tories sights @lol-lol

Defund it blame others, say we need a new tiered system, defund it a bit more, sell contracts to Palantir/ other mates of Sunak. Rinse/ repeat. 

Sunak's family has fingers in many pies but he's just a poor immigrant from a poor family nobody loves him... You know the song. 

Thatcher did that con better. 

[skomaz]

To be honest the NHS needs to be in everybody's sight...    It needs a good shake up to sort out the waste, bureacracy and lack of communication and coordination across it...

[@Lee]

Gotta laugh. The tories getting fact checked by Twitter users   
 

 

[lol-lol]

3 hours ago, skomaz said:

To be honest the NHS needs to be in everybody's sight...    It needs a good shake up to sort out the waste, bureacracy and lack of communication and coordination across it...

 

Only if one cares about care at the point of need which our current government show little effort to pull up the NHS by the bootstraps and make it even close to be a good service.

 

A family member with a serious medical need has just had the choice, wait 6 month or even 12 or 15 or pay to go private.  Same consultant.  Go NHS and you will be put out of hospital next day, if you get a serious bleed call an ambulance for A&E and we know how bad that is.  Go Private, going to cost several thousands and you will get the op in a few weeks, stay 3 days in hospital and really well looked after.

 

We now have a two tier society of the haves and have nots.

 

 The 1.5% extra NI-style tax to pay for a proper health service was dropped and senior doctors can now put £60k per year in to their pensions as an attempt to keep them working for another year or 3 or 5.

 

What an utter mess with hundreds of thousand if not millions suffering real painful hardship due to the inability of our current government to run an a half decent NHS.

  

[lol-lol]

5 minutes ago, @Lee said:

Gotta laugh. The tories getting fact checked by Twitter users   
 

 

 

The big point is that the inflation number that is really important is Core inflation and that has only moved down by 1.1% since May 2023 in to October 2023....

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/bulletins/consumerpriceinflation/october2023#:~:text=The core CPIH annual inflation,in the constructed historical series.

 

The core CPIH annual inflation rate was 5.6% in October 2023. This is the lowest rate since January 2023 and is down from 6.5% in May, which was the highest rate since November 1991, when it was also 6.5% in the constructed historical series.

 

The one hundred thousand households having to go through re-mortaging to a new fix rate will not be so happy about the inflation rate which their mortgage going up by a quarter or a half.

Save the Bank of England chairman's salary as he has been worse than useless by actually causing damage to the lives of a whole sector of people with his blunt and misdirected tool of raising interest rates to such levels but the Con government als failing to collect taxes and tax those that should pay more.

  

 

[skomaz]

26 minutes ago, lol-lol said:

 

Only if one cares about care at the point of need which our current government show little effort to pull up the NHS by the bootstraps and make it even close to be a good service.

 

A family member with a serious medical need has just had the choice, wait 6 month or even 12 or 15 or pay to go private.  Same consultant.  Go NHS and you will be put out of hospital next day, if you get a serious bleed call an ambulance for A&E and we know how bad that is.  Go Private, going to cost several thousands and you will get the op in a few weeks, stay 3 days in hospital and really well looked after.

 

We now have a two tier society of the haves and have nots.

 

 The 1.5% extra NI-style tax to pay for a proper health service was dropped and senior doctors can now put £60k per year in to their pensions as an attempt to keep them working for another year or 3 or 5.

 

What an utter mess with hundreds of thousand if not millions suffering real painful hardship due to the inability of our current government to run an a half decent NHS.

  

 

Not sure much of the above is Govt responsibility - sounds more like local health authority issues (see my above post).

[lol-lol]

National insurance cut rumoured.

 

For standard rate portion of earnings or something other than the 12% and 2% rates currently levied ?

 

[lol-lol]

Thanks Jezzer Hunt,

 

£62 more a month for Higher earners.  After the raising of the ceiling for pension diversions, mainly done for senior doctors/consultants the junior doctors get a boost as the apparently average £63K so anyone grossing over £51k, I work out, will get this £750 extra a year. 

Civil Service pensions to rise by 6.7% which is at least well above both current CPI and CPI without energy and heating costs.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/655dbc3d544aea000dfb322d/E02982473_Autumn_Statement_Nov_23_BOOK_PRINT.pdf

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3.7 Firstly, the current combined rate of income tax and National Insurance contributions (NICs) for employees paying the basic rate of tax is too high at 32%. The government will address this by cutting the main rate of Class 1 employee NICs from 12% to 10%. This will provide a tax cut for 27 million working people with the average worker on £35,400 receiving a tax cut in 2024-25 of over £450.3 By cutting taxes on work, the government is rewarding employees and providing a combined rate of income tax and NICs for an employee paying the basic rate of tax of 30% – the lowest since the 1980s.4 This change will make sure work pays, and in 2024-25:

 

• an average full-time nurse on £38,900 will receive an annual gain of over £520;

• an average teacher on £44,300 will receive an annual gain of over £630;

• an average police officer on £44,300 will receive an annual gain of over £630;

• a typical junior doctor on £63,000 will receive over £750; and

• working families with two earners on the average income will receive a gain of £900. 

 

3.8 This will take effect from 6 January 2024 so that employees benefit as soon as possible

 

(See attached.)

E02982473_Autumn_Statement_Nov_23_BOOK_PRINT.pdf