was \u00a311.6bn<\/a>.<\/p>\nGrant Fitzner, the chief economist at the ONS, said: \u201cJanuary \u2013 which is traditionally a strong month for self-assessed tax receipts \u2013 saw the highest surplus since monthly records began.<\/p>\n
\u201cRevenue was strongly up on the same time last year, while spending was little changed, due to lower debt interest payments largely offsetting higher costs on public services and benefits.\u201d<\/p>\n
The surplus meant that the deficit for the first 10 months of the year is \u00a3112.1bn, which is less than the \u00a3120.4bn the OBR had forecast, providing a bit more relief for the chancellor.<\/p>\n
The government traditionally records a surplus in January, meaning it earns more in tax revenue than it spends, because of the recording of self-assessment tax receipts in the month.<\/p>\n
However, this year has been boosted by a rise in capital gains tax receipts because of an increase in people disposing of assets ahead of what they predicted would be a rise in capital gains tax in the 2024 autumn budget.<\/p>\n
In her budget in October 2024, Reeves announced increases in the lower rate of CGT, from 10% to 18%, and the higher rate of CGT, from 20% to 24%, with these rate increases taking immediate effect.<\/p>\n
There has also been a freeze in income tax thresholds since 2022, meaning more people had been lifted into a higher tax bracket over time because of inflation.<\/p>\nOn top of these two factors, there have also been increases in national insurance contributions introduced last April and higher wage growth.<\/p>\n
James Murray, the chief secretary to the Treasury, said: \u201cWe have the right plan to build a stronger, more secure economy. We have doubled our headroom, we are bringing inflation down, we are making sure that taxpayers\u2019 money is spent wisely, and borrowing this year is forecast to be the lowest since before the pandemic.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know there is more to do to stop one in every \u00a310 the government spends going on debt interest, and we will more than halve borrowing by 2030-31 so that money can be spent on policing, schools and the NHS.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reeves has made reducing government borrowing a priority, with the national debt hitting 92.9% of gross domestic product in January, a level not seen since the early 1960s. The cost of servicing that debt is high, with \u00a31 in every \u00a310 spent by the government going on debt interest.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
#reports #recordbreaking #budget #surplus #30.4bn #surprise #boost #Rachel #Reeves #Tax #spending<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The UK government has posted t… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23501,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23500"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23500\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/23501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}