Budget 2023

It’s that time of the year again folks! Jeremy Hunt has now released the Budget for 2023, which of course had a few changes that will impact companies, businesses and, well, all of us living in the UK.

It’s impossible to include everything that was listed within the budget, so in the interest of keeping this succinct, I’ve included what I consider to be the main points – Corporation Tax, Pensions, Fuel Rates, Energy Rates, Jobs:

Corporation Tax

Companies who have taxable profits over £250,000 will pay 25% main rate of corporation tax (a large increase from the previous 19%).

Companies who have taxable profits between £50,000 and £250,000 will pay a corporation tax rate that gradually increases from 19% to 25% depending on the value of the taxable profit (specifically what these rates are in correlation to the amount of taxable profit is unclear at this time!)

Companies who have taxable profits under £50,000 will continue to pay 19% Corporation Tax.

Companies will now be entitled to deduct the cost of investment in new machinery/technology to lower taxable profit for the next 3 years.

Pensions

The yearly tax-free allowance for pensions has risen from £40,000 to £60,000.

There used to be a £1.07m cap on the amount workers could accumulate in pension savings before paying additional tax – this has now been abolished.

Fuel

They have decided to keep the 5p cut on fuel duty on petrol/diesel for another year (originally, this was meant to end in April 2023).

Energy

The energy bill subsidies (limiting household energy bills to £2,500) will be extended for 3 months and now end in June…after that, we’re on our own!

If you are on a prepayment meter then these prices will fall in-line with the same costs as people paying via direct-debit.

Jobs

Free childcare of 30 hours for working parents will extend to cover the cost of one and two-year-olds as well.

Universal Credit for families will NOT be paid in arrears any longer, instead they will be paid upfront.

Universal Credit cap of £646 per month, per child is being raised to £951 per month, per child.

New programmes will be introduced to help people over 50 who are retired get back to work.

With heavy labour shortages in the construction sector, the government are relaxing immigration rules.