Autumn Statement - what happens now?

Newsletter issue - December 2023

Many of you will have watched the Chancellor Jeremy Hunt delivering his Autumn Statement a few weeks ago. You may have watched the whole speech or just seen clips on news programmes later in the day. As always, many announcements were made and there was plenty to digest.

The actual statement is the bit most people are familiar with, but what happens next? What's the process? Which announcements are set to become reality and how soon?

Whenever a government announces new taxation in a Budget or Spring or Autumn Statement, these plans require statutory (or legislative) authority.

In line with this, The Autumn Finance Bill has now been published to enshrine the announced tax changes into law.

The Bill received its first reading in Parliament on Monday 27 November 2023. It will now follow the normal passage through Parliament. The majority of tax changes in the Bill will take effect from April 2024.

Recap - the biggest changes set to come

In case you need a reminder of what came out of the Autumn Statement 2023, here's a high-level recap of some of the most important changes that were delivered on the day:

The Chancellor's critical announcements:

• Reduction in employees' National Insurance (NI) by two percentage points from 12% to 10% (for Primary Class 1 contributions) - a change affecting an estimated 27 million people
• Class 4 NI will be reduced from 9% to 8% in April 2024
• Class 2 NI will be effectively abolished
• A proposal for a new system of 'one pension pot for life'
• State pension payments to increase by 8.5% from the next tax year
• National Living Wage to rise by about 10% to £11.44 from April 2024