Overview of the chancellor’s 2022 Spring Statement

Key points

• The view seems to be that the chancellor did not come out of the post-statement interviews well.
• The alignment of the personal allowance with the National Insurance contributions threshold makes sense from a tax simplification point of view.
• Changing the National Insurance threshold part-way through the tax year is likely to cause problems for software producers and self-employed workers.
• The tax plan document was disappointingly low on detail.

The chancellor really shouldn’t make major economic statements on a Wednesday. It plays havoc with our publishing schedule because we go to press on a Tuesday morning so we cannot cover it in the issue which drops through readers’ letter boxes on a Thursday. But at least this gives us a few days to think more closely about what last week’s Spring Statement actually means and to take account of what the political and economic reactions have been.

The general...