The Chancellor Philip Hammond’s inaugural Autumn Statement was not expected to deliver widespread tax changes and other than some tweaking at the edges, there wasn’t much of note.
The majority of the tweaking seems to have been focused on the relationship between employer and employee. Changes to the Employee Shareholder Status giving us the only surprise of the day with its effective abolishment with immediate effect.
Tinkering with the Employee and Employer National Insurance Contribution thresholds follows the announcement in the spring budget of the abolition of Class 2 contributions. The salary sacrifice rules similarly have been restricted.
The reiteration of the future increases in personal allowances and the already announced reduction in the Corporation Tax rate did nothing to ally the gloom surrounding the predicted UK growth figures. Whilst the increase in spending on R&D, digital technology and Local Enterprise Partnership grants was welcome, how the benefit of these measures will cascade down to clients is yet unclear.
Clients no doubt will welcome the announcement of the changes to the Spring Budget/ Autumn Statement. Having one date where changes to the tax regime will be introduced will hopefully allow better public consultation.
To read our full overview of the Autumn Statement 2016 click here.
Disclaimer
The information was correct at time of publishing but may now be out of date.
