Spring Statement 2022 - initial thoughts

A few weeks ago the smoke signals from the Treasury suggested that the chancellor would have nothing to say today about tax. By the beginning of this week it seemed that everything had changed and tax would now be centre stage. I even saw one report that suggested Rishi Sunak would unveil a major reform of corporation tax so we really went into today’s statement blind. Would we be facing another all-nighter ploughing through thousands of pages of press releases or would we be able to sit back and enjoy afternoon tea?

It became pretty clear early on in the speech that the support for lower paid families would have to be balanced with the impact on the economy of the Ukraine conflict particularly a predicted inflation rate of more than 7%. Even a few weeks ago it could never have occurred to the chancellor that he...