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1:38

Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. Hello.

1:42

Well, after weeks of speculation, this Moneybox Live

1:44

podcast can finally ditch the

1:46

budget rumours and deal with the facts.

1:50

The Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, has opened the famous,

1:52

or maybe infamous, red

1:54

briefcase and set out the government's spending

1:56

plans. Now, this is almost

1:58

certainly an election year. making this an

2:01

incredibly political budget. But here at the

2:03

Moneybox Life podcast, we are focusing on

2:05

what the announcements mean for your finances.

2:08

Here's what the Chancellor had to say to

2:10

working taxpayers. From April the

2:13

6th, employee national insurance

2:15

will be cut by another 2P.

2:18

And for some parents? I confirm

2:20

that from this April, the

2:22

high-income child benefit charge threshold will be

2:25

raised from £50,000 to £60,000. And

2:30

for those really struggling with the cost of living, an

2:32

extension of the Household Support Fund.

2:35

Now is not the time to stop the

2:37

targeted help it offers. We will

2:40

therefore continue it at current levels for another

2:42

six months. Well, that's just a

2:44

few clips. He spoke for more than an hour.

2:46

So what does what he said mean for your

2:48

money? Now, before we unpack

2:50

the Chancellor's briefcase full of announcements, how

2:52

are people feeling? And what did they

2:55

want him to prioritise? Well, ahead of

2:57

the speech, I went out to the

2:59

award-winning Warrington Market to ask traders and

3:01

shoppers there how their finances are fairing.

3:03

And I started off out of butchers.

3:06

Got sausage, bacon, chops, cooked

3:09

meats, ribs, bacon, and all that

3:11

sort of stuff. Do you eat a lot of pork? Not

3:13

really, no. And

3:16

can I ask, how are you feeling at the

3:18

moment about your finances, about the cost of living?

3:20

Do you think it's easing up? No, I don't.

3:22

I think it's getting worse. I think it's going

3:24

to get worse before it gets better. I

3:26

think everyone's struggling, especially with food. I

3:29

live on my own. I'm a single parent and it's

3:31

really sort of tough trying

3:34

to sort of keep my head above water at

3:36

the minute. And I'm fighting a losing battle. There's

3:39

a lot of my wages go towards tax. And

3:43

so, yeah, taxes, major. I'm

3:45

selling Irish white puddings, black puddings,

3:48

best bacon, bacon chops, then

3:51

some cracking pies that everybody loves. And how's

3:53

business? Are your customers, do they have

3:55

as much to spend as they're used to? No, that

3:58

is the trouble. They're

4:00

all watching what they're spending

4:02

now and very worried by

4:04

the finances. So what would you

4:06

like the Chancellor to do? What would help your

4:08

finances? I don't think he's

4:11

got a lot of room to help me. It

4:13

worries me that he's going to drop

4:15

the insurance or down by that. What

4:18

point is that to anybody? What

4:20

we need to do is get this

4:23

country's finances in straight and then give

4:25

some stable chance of a business to

4:27

increase and feel

4:29

as though they can increase. Oh, we

4:31

haven't got any finances. We just haven't got any money.

4:35

Some of the traders and shoppers at Warrington

4:37

Market there. Well, we'll meet today to take

4:39

a look at the budget and explain all.

4:42

Sarah Coles, who's Head of Personal

4:44

Finance at Hargreaves Land Zone. Simon

4:46

Gammon, Managing Partner at the Mortgage

4:48

Broker at Nightfrank Finance. And Dawn

4:50

Register, who's Tax Partner at the

4:52

Accountancy Firm BDO. Good afternoon. Good

4:55

afternoon. Hello. There you go. Enthusiastic budget

4:58

day. Good afternoon. Sarah,

5:00

did anything surprise you in the budget?

5:03

Well, an awful lot of it had been told. So obviously the big

5:05

hit was that P.P. cuts national insurance, which

5:07

we did know about in advance. And

5:09

I think the thing that came sort of out of left

5:11

field was this British savings bond, which we don't have a

5:14

lot of details on it just yet. But it looks like

5:16

a sort of three year, six rate bond. So

5:18

yeah, we'll have to keep our fingers crossed for a decent

5:20

rate. But it is something that's brand new in the market.

5:23

Simon, what about you? Were you perhaps expecting more or did

5:25

anything come out of the left field for you? I

5:27

think, like I said, no huge surprises. I think maybe

5:29

the capital gains reduction on second homes being sold was

5:31

a bit of a surprise. But

5:33

time will tell to see whether that actually motivates

5:36

people to bring property to the market. And we'll

5:38

talk more about that as well in just a minute. Dawn,

5:40

what about you? The VAT

5:43

threshold for businesses to register

5:45

for that increasing from 85,000 to 90,000 wasn't

5:51

pre-released. And that is

5:53

the first increase in seven years. So I

5:55

think that will be welcomed. Although it's a small

5:57

tweak, it does make a difference. Thank

5:59

you. very much right let's talk about that

6:01

national insurance change

6:03

because there were lots of calls lots

6:06

of rumors of different kinds of tax

6:08

cuts what's actually been announced is that

6:10

two pence cut in national insurance and

6:12

that's the second time Jeremy Hunt has

6:14

cut it. Moneybox reporter Dan Whitworth is

6:16

here in the studio can talk us

6:18

through the detail Dan maybe start by

6:20

telling us a little bit about national

6:22

insurance. Okay Fliss so I've

6:24

printed out a fairly stereotypical pay slip I've

6:26

got it here now the big number in

6:28

the bottom right is what most people go

6:30

straight to look at how much you get

6:32

as do I that's how much you get

6:35

in your pocket or more likely gets transferred

6:37

into your bank account but that column called

6:39

deductions well that's a painful one that people

6:41

check out too how much money is taken

6:43

out of your pay so things like income

6:45

tax student loan payments or

6:47

pension contributions if you have them and

6:49

of course national insurance now as you

6:51

say Fliss those national insurance contributions are

6:54

going to go down by two pence

6:56

in every pound you earn saving

6:59

the average worker 450 pounds a year

7:01

but this new cut is in addition

7:03

to the exact same cut the Chancellor

7:05

announced in the autumn so 900 pounds

7:07

in total. Okay but

7:09

that's not the only tax coming out of our

7:11

pay slips so we'll talk about income tax in

7:13

just a moment first of all they down what

7:15

about if you're self-employed? Okay so that's

7:18

slightly different as from April the

7:20

Chancellor said two million self-employed people

7:22

will pay six percent on their

7:24

profits between twelve thousand five hundred

7:27

and seventy one pounds and fifty

7:29

thousand two hundred and seventy pounds

7:31

that's down from eight percent they

7:33

also won't pay class two contributions

7:36

the government calculates total savings will

7:38

be six hundred and fifty pounds

7:40

for self-employed people. Dan thank you

7:42

very much let's just hear from

7:44

Rachel who works as an administrator

7:47

for her husband's company she thinks

7:49

January's reduction in national insurance didn't

7:52

really make a difference to her finances. Well

7:54

about ten-quid a month if that's hardly worth

7:56

it whether it should have happened I don't

7:58

know I think people managing with it as

8:00

it was before so the actual benefit to me

8:02

wasn't that much so but the benefit to the

8:04

nation would have been better I think. Right

8:07

Dawn as Dawn was saying if you take the two

8:09

cuts together from the autumn statement and from

8:11

this budget and I'm very sure that's what

8:13

the Chancellor is hoping people will do the

8:16

average saving is about £900 but

8:18

the higher your income the greater the

8:20

saving. Correct and this

8:23

only applies to those who are subjected

8:26

to national insurance so those who are

8:28

below the state pension age and it

8:30

also only applies to workers so

8:32

employees and self-employed individuals

8:36

and it really doesn't negate which I

8:38

think is the person

8:40

who was just talking there about they

8:42

haven't noticed it in their pocket it

8:44

does not negate fiscal drag

8:47

which is income tax rates

8:49

have remained the same in particular

8:52

the personal allowance so the £12,570 that everyone

8:54

can earn tax free has remained

8:59

frozen since 2021 and

9:01

still remains frozen and that

9:03

has a massive impact. We'll talk about that in

9:05

just a moment but a lot of people getting

9:07

in touch on that question of who benefits and

9:10

the fact that if you're above state pension age

9:12

you don't nick his email to say do the

9:14

66 and over working population

9:16

gain anything from the 2P cut in national

9:18

insurance it doesn't sound like it to me

9:20

and he's put an eye-rolling

9:22

emoji. Liz says for

9:24

the cut in national insurance is to encourage

9:26

people into work and reward work nothing for

9:29

those of us who work past retirement because

9:31

we have to or we choose to. Dawn

9:34

thank you let's talk then about that

9:36

other key tax income tax and as

9:38

Dawn saying the thresholds for that have been

9:40

frozen since 2021. Here's Darren now

9:43

he works for the NHS he says he

9:45

pays too much tax and in fact he's recently

9:47

started paying more into his pension to move himself

9:49

down a band from the highest to the middle.

9:52

There's no incentive to go to that next

9:54

level because you didn't get taxed and you're

9:57

like you're working for effectively nothing. No incentive

9:59

for me. personally to go up to

10:01

the next door, scraped off tax and

10:03

the extra possibilities, it doesn't work out. Sarah,

10:06

so Darren there saying there's no incentive

10:08

to earn more. Dawn's mentioned fiscal drag,

10:10

can you just explain it to

10:13

us? Because we know the personal allowance threshold

10:16

and tax bans, the current plan is that they

10:18

will be frozen until 2028. What

10:21

impact does that have? Yeah,

10:23

so it doesn't have any impact sort of

10:25

immediately. The problem comes when people get pay

10:27

rises. So obviously we've had such high inflation

10:29

that people actually have been getting more pay

10:31

rises. And as your pay goes up, because

10:33

those thresholds are sort of held steady, you

10:35

go over the threshold. So it means more

10:37

people pay more tax and more people paying

10:39

a higher rate of tax. So

10:41

when I say more, there's about two million

10:43

people who are affected by this. And

10:46

one of the things that is worth bearing in

10:48

mind, so because your

10:50

benefit from the cuts in national insurance will

10:52

depend on what you earn, it actually means

10:54

that lower earners, once you sort

10:56

of factor in this fiscal drag idea and the

10:58

national insurance cut, lower earners are actually worse off

11:00

than they would have been if none of it

11:02

had happened. So it's anyone

11:04

earning less than £19,000 actually ends up worse

11:06

off. Whereas if you take someone who's earning

11:09

for the £50,000, they're actually £1,200 better off.

11:13

So massive difference between higher earners and

11:15

lower earners. And from the people you

11:17

were chatting to in the markets, it's

11:19

those people on those low incomes who

11:21

are really struggling right now. And what's

11:24

interesting is you sort of think of fiscal drag

11:26

as people being dragged into those higher tax

11:28

bans. But the Office for Budget Responsibility says that

11:31

by 2028 to 2029,

11:33

fiscal drag will have brought 3.7

11:35

million more people into paying tax.

11:37

So Sarah, just paying tax in

11:39

the first place. Yes.

11:41

And the other thing to remember is it doesn't

11:43

just affect your income tax ban. So if you

11:45

go into, for example, a higher rate tax ban,

11:47

you will then pay more tax on your savings.

11:49

You'll pay more tax on any profits that you

11:51

make from things like investing or

11:53

for things like selling a second property. So it

11:55

affects you right across the board if you sort

11:57

of move into a higher tax bracket. Yes,

12:00

as you say in, it is not Lot

12:02

of people who are on pensions at the

12:04

moment own relatively small pet private pensions. When

12:06

added to the site, pensions are now paying

12:09

tax because this for the first allowed hasn't

12:11

moved. So if you look at these see

12:13

things together, the national insurance and the yes,

12:15

the Fiscal Drag issue, The Resolution Foundation suggests

12:17

that this can be about twenty billion pounds

12:19

of tax cuts through national insurance rates, but

12:21

about thirty five billion pounds of tax rises.

12:24

Three that effective tax rises.

12:26

Three, those frozen thresholds. right?

12:28

Another big change announced today with a

12:30

rise in the high income it's child

12:33

Benefit Charge threshold. This is essentially the

12:35

point at which a family begins to

12:37

lose child benefit if even one parent

12:39

And above that that had been set

12:41

at fifty thousand pounds since it was

12:43

first introduced. So if a parent and

12:46

more than that, it begins to taper

12:48

off. and by the time a parent

12:50

and sixty thousand pounds, it's. It's stopped.

12:52

or clawed. Back completely meant that more

12:55

than a quarter of families with children

12:57

have lost some or all of that

12:59

child benefit us, according to the Institute

13:01

for Fiscal Studies dawn. Big change in

13:04

that today that's going to rise. Yes,

13:06

I mean, this is welcome. So we've

13:08

got some short term increases to the

13:11

threshold, but we've actually got a commitment

13:13

to reform the whole charge and the

13:15

way it works by April Twenty twenty

13:18

six. and we don't have the detail

13:20

on Latin. We hope there's a consultation

13:22

on that. So people can a

13:24

proper with their views. But yes

13:27

the threshold. Increase to sixty. Thousand

13:29

pounds and also that phasing out period

13:31

for you. Now don't lose the village,

13:34

the Arab, the benefits until you reach

13:36

eighty thousand pounds. So both those numbers

13:38

increased today and that is welcome a

13:41

know later they are Yeah exactly. Is

13:43

that Bank Zones emailed about this and

13:45

he says just contact you regarding the

13:48

high earning sacked charge. For once my

13:50

prayers have been answered. I've been praying

13:52

for that the a change to this

13:55

tax charge and don't that other change.

13:57

You mentioned the yep that the promise

13:59

to. to consult that and to

14:01

change the system. This is to address that

14:03

unfairness where a single high

14:06

earner means the family loses the benefit.

14:08

But if two parents, for example, were

14:10

both earning just below 50 grand each,

14:12

that family would keep it. Correct. And

14:14

it's going to be quite hard for

14:16

HMRC to administer this because we do

14:18

have the principle of independent taxation. But of

14:21

course, they actually need to collect

14:23

household data and how they do that

14:26

might be quite a challenge. I mean, prior to 2013,

14:28

this was not a means

14:30

tested benefit at all. Everyone

14:32

received child benefit. So I'm sure that

14:34

it will open up the whole debate

14:36

about how we

14:39

distribute this money and to ensure it's

14:41

fair. But any effort to

14:44

address this unfairness is welcome.

14:46

So that is something aimed at what

14:49

the government would describe as middle

14:51

income families. There were in

14:53

today's budget a number of announcements aimed

14:55

at people in the most vulnerable financial

14:58

positions. So scrapping the

15:00

£90 fee for debt relief orders,

15:02

extending household support, the Household Support

15:04

Fund for another six months. That's

15:07

money that helps councils provide support

15:09

to food banks, warm banks, food

15:11

vouchers, that kind of thing. Sarah, those

15:13

are important changes. There was also, though, a change

15:15

for the 1 million households on

15:17

universal credit who take out advances to

15:20

help them pay for big, perhaps

15:22

unexpected costs, things like boiler repairs or

15:24

moving. What's changing? Yeah,

15:26

so the idea is that if you have one of

15:29

these big one-off costs, you can apply in order to

15:31

have your universal credit early. So you sort of apply

15:33

for an advance. Now, at the moment, you have to

15:35

pay that back over 12 months. And the plan

15:37

is to stretch that further. So you have 24 months

15:40

to pay it back. And that really means that it

15:42

takes the pressure off people when they're trying to pay

15:44

it back. It is worth putting that in a tiny

15:46

bit of context in that actually at

15:48

this point, we've just had the last of

15:50

those cost of living payments that households have

15:53

been getting. So a lot of people have

15:55

been sort of running relying On those to

15:57

sort of help bump up those one-off costs.

15:59

So hopefully... therefore for help eating slightly, but

16:01

it doesn't Not the genesis of giving them

16:03

a three hundred pound lump sum, which is

16:05

what we've had in previous years. Now we've

16:07

had some reaction to. This from those

16:09

he supports people in debt. Let's hear

16:11

from Richard Lane. he's from the charity

16:14

Step Change. We. Must going to

16:16

be really important so the households

16:18

can pay at a more affordable

16:20

rate when they're making those repayments

16:22

or most advances. But we still

16:24

do worry that many households are

16:26

facing deductions to the Universal credit

16:29

if they got things like historic

16:31

government debt that they might oh

16:33

but often pushes households and real

16:35

hardship. We've also seen Stain announcement

16:37

that the ninety pounds application fee

16:39

for debt relief for this is

16:41

going to be scrapped, and we

16:43

really welcome that we know. The

16:45

having to make that payment before you

16:47

can access a really important debt solution

16:49

like it it really for that can

16:51

be a real barrier to people taking

16:53

out a debt advice or going on

16:55

to a debt solutions. We also know

16:57

that there were charities across the country

16:59

are having to find the money to

17:01

pay for those fees, so that's a

17:03

really big and important step forward for

17:05

people who marry me to debt relief.

17:07

Order out as wretched lane from step

17:09

change at Don't Quit. Talking about Fiscal

17:12

Drag and it's impact on on people

17:14

who are earning an income Tang Income

17:16

Tax Audits Day The thin and thoughts

17:18

are his emails. Money Box at Btc,

17:20

Dakota Ek to St. Jude Fiscal Drag

17:23

I now pay tax on my state

17:25

pension. Crazy I that is. as as

17:27

as that rises and the band's remain

17:29

frozen. That does affect people. He retired.

17:32

Absolutely. Any and sex people.

17:34

With rising up with increases in

17:36

interest rates. He effect size and

17:39

says well I'm and of course

17:41

as seven mentioned as a pensions

17:43

and other pensions have increased at.

17:45

With the inflationary pressures, I'm

17:48

under tax. Rates have not kept pace

17:50

and we would like to see an.

17:52

Increase in the past allowance that

17:54

would make a big difference to

17:56

those people who, for example, unless

17:59

the nine. Thousand Pounds state pension

18:01

plans may be a private pension Rights

18:03

simon. You've been waiting patiently and that

18:05

the have been a few important changes

18:07

for housing haven't that? Let let's start

18:09

off with us a change. The capital

18:12

Gains taxes gonna be a change to

18:14

the higher. Rate of property capital

18:16

gains explain that to. I'm

18:19

serious. I'm it's or the big change

18:21

for second homes being sold was this.

18:23

Services isn't that. Would you still have it? Tell us

18:26

about the changes. Unpack them. Well I

18:28

think what we've got his am a number things

18:30

would come up today from property market and the

18:32

festival was the capital gains tax will second for

18:34

hims being sold which was a surprise to hear

18:37

during the protests against tax on a of property

18:39

that isn't your highlights are correct and isn't your

18:41

main home and as you something a second home

18:43

and I think my chances coming with us when

18:46

is is is he trying to encourage people who

18:48

perhaps been hesitant to sell a second property to

18:50

bring it to the market by giving them this

18:52

capital gains tax plan and of course A He's

18:55

been making a lot of changes around further and.

18:57

First holiday lex and am and

18:59

is mentioned some changes to stamp

19:01

duty as well. My case, let's.

19:03

Just that that time the higher rates

19:05

of Prophecy gains tax That's get a

19:07

full isn't it from twenty eight cents,

19:09

twenty four percent thrust. significant potential changes

19:11

that i'm an ensign stamps you to

19:13

release. The people buying more than one

19:15

dwelling is being abolished. Think a lot

19:17

of people listening wouldn't know that that

19:19

kind of stamps you to really had

19:21

even existed. Can you explain what the

19:23

rules were before today? The Shore of

19:26

course. So basically if you were

19:28

buying six or more properties there

19:30

was a relief on stamp duty

19:32

and it really only affected those

19:34

who have very very wealthy people

19:36

buying often new homes am the

19:38

in bulk. Ah, and so it's

19:40

really have a closing of a

19:42

loophole rather than am a great

19:44

saving for anybody and is unlikely

19:46

to get niches. Were first time

19:48

buyers I suppose about if he

19:50

wasn't. Mentioned that it was being abused. I

19:53

think of one since the first time buyers might

19:55

have been I think for the had been I

19:57

discussed in. the press ahead of today with

19:59

this idea of ninety nine percent mortgages and

20:01

there were rumours that the Chancellor was considering

20:03

that, that it would help, would be first-time

20:05

buyers who had very small deposits. But it

20:08

wasn't in the statement, in the budget, and

20:10

there was a lot of industry

20:12

concern over the plan. That's right,

20:14

yeah, the Government is obviously keen to do anything

20:17

that seems to be helping first-time buyers. However, in

20:19

order to run these schemes, you really need lenders

20:21

to join forces with you. And

20:23

those sort of loan to values, 99% mortgages,

20:26

even with Government guarantees, there just wasn't the

20:28

appetite from the lending community. And so it

20:30

was canned for now. However, I would suspect

20:32

that we won't be the last time we

20:35

hear about first-time buyers before the election. And

20:38

Sarah, I mean, there is still some help

20:40

for first-time buyers, isn't there? Some existing help

20:42

through the Lifetime ISA? Yeah,

20:45

so the Lifetime ISA is somewhere

20:47

that you've got an allowance of £4,000 a year, and

20:50

if you put £4,000 in, it gets topped up by the Government

20:52

to £1,000. And you can spend

20:55

that on buying a first property, or

20:58

you can hang onto it and use it for retirement. And

21:01

we were actually hoping to see a change to that

21:04

in the announcement today. We were

21:06

hoping to see that basically,

21:08

if you use it for any other reason

21:11

than those two specific things, buying

21:13

a house or retiring, you

21:15

currently pay a penalty of 25%, which doesn't

21:18

just take away the Government bonus, it takes

21:20

away some of your money as well. We

21:23

were expecting to see that change, we were expecting

21:25

to see that drop to 20%, which would help

21:27

a lot of people, but it would also help

21:29

first-time buyers who wanted to buy a slightly more

21:31

expensive property than the scheme allows. So

21:34

if they wanted to buy something that costs

21:36

more than £450,000, at the moment, they have

21:38

to pay the penalty. And the hope was

21:40

that that penalty for buying a slightly more

21:43

expensive property would then drop. We didn't see

21:45

any mention of it at all in the

21:47

budget, and there's nothing in the supporting documents

21:50

either. So unfortunately, we were expecting it and

21:52

it just didn't happen. well,

22:00

you can open them if you're under 40. You can save

22:02

up to £4,000 a year and get a

22:04

government top-up of 25%, so a maximum of £1,000 a year.

22:06

And as you say, Sarah, no change.

22:10

And we've had an email from Elaine about

22:12

that. She says, so disappointed that he didn't

22:14

change the Lisa, the Lysa, to stop penalising

22:16

first-time buyers who lose more of their savings

22:18

when they cash it in, purely because they

22:20

cannot find a home to buy it for

22:22

less than £450,000. OK,

22:25

there was, though, some significant changes

22:27

for savers, or significant, there were

22:29

some changes for savers, weren't there,

22:32

Sarah? You are allowed

22:34

to save up to £20,000 a year into

22:37

an Lysa, into a normal Lysa. That's

22:39

going to rise for certain investments through

22:42

a British Lysa. Yes.

22:44

So at the moment, we're all in a

22:46

consultation stage with this. So we, you know,

22:48

there's nothing happening overnight. There's nothing to get

22:50

this host about just yet. So basically, the

22:53

plan is to introduce this extra £5,000 allowance

22:55

specifically for investing in British companies in what's

22:57

sort of been called the British Lysa. Now,

22:59

there's a huge amount to be ironed out

23:01

about how that works and to make sure

23:03

that it actually does help encourage

23:05

more people to invest in the UK

23:08

without actually damaging, rather

23:10

than one of the problems with it is whether

23:12

it's going to end up overly focusing their investments

23:14

in one place. So there's quite a lot to be

23:16

ironed out. But overall, if it does come in, it

23:18

will mean this extra £5,000 that you can put into

23:21

an Lysa, which has to be a good thing. We'll

23:24

have to wait for the details to know

23:26

exactly how it'll work. So that's the British

23:28

Lysa. Also news about a new British savings

23:30

bond. Yes. So this

23:32

is, it was the thing that came

23:34

out of the blue for us anyway, that the national savings

23:36

investments are going to launch a three year bond. At

23:39

the moment, we don't know what rate it's

23:41

going to pay. An awful lot will depend on the

23:43

rate. So we saw from when they launched this exciting

23:45

new green bond that when the rate on that was

23:47

disappointing, it didn't attract a lot of

23:50

attention. Now, but one of the problems is

23:52

three year rates at the moment are actually

23:54

quite poor compared to shorter term fixes. So

23:56

we might not get much excitement around that

23:58

rate when it comes out. But the idea

24:00

is that obviously that you're putting money aside

24:02

in this British savings bond in order to

24:04

raise finance for the government to spend on

24:06

British projects. So we'll have to wait to

24:08

find out what the rate is and how

24:10

it's actually going to work in terms of

24:12

funding. But it is hopefully another source of

24:14

finance for British companies who are trying to

24:16

grow. Lots of people getting in

24:18

touch with their views on the budget. Some

24:20

people celebrating things like the change to child

24:22

benefit. But Amanda's been in touch to say

24:24

how utterly, utterly depressing the budget is. Right,

24:27

Simon, you've mentioned it. Let's

24:41

dig into it. The budget included a pretty

24:44

significant change to anybody who rents out

24:46

a holiday home. They currently get extra

24:49

tax relief compared to private

24:51

rentals. What is it that's changing? Well,

24:53

it's a well-documented change. So if you own a

24:56

property that you let out for holidays, you have

24:58

been able to register it as a business. And

25:00

as a business, you could offset a number of

25:02

expenses against the income that you generated to

25:05

lower your tax bill. So for example, mortgage

25:07

interest, if you bought furniture, etc. And

25:11

you could have benefited from lower capital gains tax. And

25:13

by claiming small business rate relief, you may

25:16

have been able to not pay council tax

25:18

as well. And that's all been abolished

25:20

today. The Chancellor said this

25:22

will help local housing markets, which it

25:24

may to some extent. But I

25:26

think the bigger national housing shortages is probably the bigger

25:28

picture there. And that's the only true fix. If

25:31

you own a holiday let, I think getting some good

25:33

advice now is key. And you may

25:35

wish to consider letting your property now for longer

25:37

term lets, even perhaps to local people.

25:40

Okay. And is this, do you think,

25:42

going to make a difference to the number of

25:44

homes that are just available on the market for

25:47

people to rent to live in, which particularly in

25:49

these holiday hotspots can be such a problem? I

25:53

think it's a positive change locally, but I'm

25:55

afraid I don't believe it's going to be

25:58

the silver bullet. It's going to have a negative impact. help

26:00

perhaps some existing

26:02

second homeowners look, as I

26:04

said, to the long term let's and that could

26:06

be done locally to local people. But

26:10

I think the housing shortage is the major issue

26:12

and still that remains unsolved.

26:15

And Dawn, this is expected, this change is expected to

26:17

raise something like 300 million pounds a

26:19

year. So it does sound like it'll be quite

26:21

expensive for anyone who's affected. Absolutely.

26:24

I think the

26:27

point is that if you're a landlord, the

26:29

tax relief, as Simon mentioned,

26:32

have diminished over the years in terms of

26:35

what you can deduct for tax purposes. And

26:40

if you're a landlord earning 30,000 pounds a

26:42

year, then you would currently save 4,000

26:45

pounds. Now that's going to be

26:47

abolished. So it does make

26:49

it more expensive to be a landlord.

26:52

Thank you. Right. Let's talk about what

26:54

are sometimes called syntaxes, alcohol, cigarettes, vaping

26:57

now, apparently. Dawn, there was a pretty

26:59

big change for vapes. Yes,

27:01

this was widely predicted that

27:03

there will be a new duty on

27:05

vaping from the 1st of

27:10

October, 2026. So quite a long run

27:12

in actually, which was quite surprising. And

27:15

also duty on

27:18

cigarettes will increase as well. So

27:21

clearly trying to drive behavior there and

27:24

also linked to the environment, there will

27:26

be an increase in air passenger duty

27:28

on business class flights. Now,

27:31

what was quite interesting was that fuel duty didn't

27:33

rise as planned. I mean, I say it's interesting.

27:35

It never rises as planned, does it? It's been

27:37

frozen every year since 2011.

27:40

It was actually cut by an

27:42

extra 5P in 2022. That

27:45

was only meant to be temporary, but it was

27:47

extended last year. And Dawn, now we know it's

27:49

extended again. It will be a big relief,

27:51

though, for a lot of motorists. I

27:53

think so. This is kind of positive

27:55

money in the pocket, the average owner

27:59

of a car. will save about £50

28:01

next year as a result of this.

28:03

As you say, it hasn't increased for

28:05

13 years, so it would have been

28:07

very unpopular to do that, particularly in

28:10

an election year. And in a

28:12

sentence, Dawn, do you think there's anything missing from the budget? For

28:15

me, there wasn't many resources

28:17

for HMRC and for many

28:20

people with their tax bills,

28:22

they are struggling. There was

28:24

£140 million promised for debt

28:26

management, but that is really a

28:28

drip in the ocean and service levels remain

28:30

at an all-time low according to

28:34

the Public Accounts Committee. So we would have liked to

28:36

have seen more resources for HMRC.

28:38

Well, that is all we have time for in

28:41

this Moneybox Live podcast, meaning that we took 35

28:43

minutes less than a Chancellor himself. Admittedly,

28:46

we weren't being interrupted by shouting

28:48

MPs. Huge thanks to everybody

28:50

who took part in the programme, and

28:52

thank you of course to our experts.

28:54

We've been hearing from Sarah Coles from

28:56

Hargreaves Lansdowne, Dawn Register from BDO, and

28:58

Simon Gaman from Nightfrank Finance. If

29:01

you have any questions or comments on

29:03

the budget or any financial story you'd

29:05

like us to take a look at,

29:07

then get in touch with us now.

29:09

You can email moneybox at bbc.co.uk. In

29:12

this podcast, the producer was Craig

29:14

Henderson and Kath Patterson, production coordinator

29:16

Sandra Hardiel, studio manager Matthew Dempsey.

29:18

Our editor is Sarah Rogers. I'm

29:20

Felicity Hannah, and this was a

29:23

BBC News Money and Work production

29:25

for BBC Sands. Hello,

29:27

I'm David Yelland. And I'm Simon Lewis.

29:30

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