Tax Journal's 2025 Autumn Budget coverage

The Chancellor preparing to present her Budget (copyright HM Treasury)

From the editor

All Budgets are inherently political, and this one was no exception. You could call it ‘pragmatic’ - with the overall package 'clearly targeted at two specific audiences: the bond markets and Labour backbenchers' (Duncan Weldon). The Government rightly says it is focused on growth, but anyone hoping for radical, system-shaping reforms – perhaps drawing on the recent proposals from CenTax, Tax Policy Associates and other policy specialists, to tackle cliff-edges and remove distortions – will have come away disappointed. As Helen Miller (IFS) noted, ‘a grand tax-reforming Budget this certainly was not’.

Like last year's affair, this is ‘another high-taxing Budget, but from different sources’ (Julian Feiner, DAC Beachcroft). The smorgasbord of tax measures include a 'mansion tax', a cap on pension salary-sacrifice, a future mileage charge for EVs and a cut in CGT relief for EOTs - but it's the extended freezing of the personal allowance and income tax thresholds until April 2031 that's doing the heavy lifting. More complexity is added to the UK tax code, with ‘three new rates of income tax, as well as other taxes, levies and exemptions’ (Christine Cairns, PwC). But as David Milne KC (Pump Court Tax Chambers) reminds us, ‘there will be the usual complaints about the tax burden on working people, but it is very modest compared with the 1960s and 1970s.' 

Further measures were announced to close the tax gap, so we can ‘expect a more proactive HMRC and a tougher compliance environment’ (Adam Craggs, RPC). But it’s worth remembering, as Eloise Walker points out, there is some welcome news in the detail – on EMIs, capital allowances and a stamp duty holiday for new UK stock listings, to name a few. And after all the speculation over proposals that never materialised – exit tax, NICs on LLPs, further restrictions on pension tax relief – some might even be feeling slightly relieved.

Analysis

More of a stew than a smorgasbord?

The Chancellor managed to deliver a package that felt both familiar and, in places, surprisingly bold, writes Chris Sanger (EY).

Budget 2025: the tax measures

A detailed report by Lexis®+ UK Tax, with additional practitioner insight:

• The delayed Budget that arrived early

  Julian Feiner (DAC Beachcroft)

• A Cheshire-cat type of a Budget?

  Gerald Montagu (Gide Loyrette Nouel)

• Complaints old and new: what the Budget really tells us about tax

  David Milne KC (Pump Court Tax Chambers)

• Two things about corporation tax

  Eloise Walker (Pinsent Masons)

• The cost of being an owner manager

  Peter Rayney (past president of the CIOT)

• International private client tax issues

  Lynnette Bober (Joseph Hage Aaronson)

• CGT aspects

  Robert Langston (Saffery)

• Carried interest: the dog that didn’t bark?

  Bezhan Salehy (Macfarlanes)

• Property taxes: it could have been worse

  Elizabeth Bradley (Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner)

• Issues surrounding the ‘mansion tax’

  Sophie Dworetzsky (Lombard Odier)

• Expect a more proactive HMRC and a tougher compliance environment

  Adam Craggs (RPC)

• Budget changes to pensions

  Penny Cogher (Irwin Mitchell)

• Pension salary sacrifice: considerations for employers

  Sarah Hewson (Crowe UK)

• DST heading for a Clash: should I stay, or should I go now?

  Patrick O'Gara (Baker & McKenzie)

• HMRC’s whistleblower scheme launches with limited detail

  Craig Kirkham-Wilson (Simmons & Simmons)

• Curtailing TOMS

  Etienne Wong (Old Square Tax Chambers)

• Gambling duty reform: higher rates where higher risk of harm

  Ceri Stoner (Wiggin)

• Energy: the fiscal regime post-EPL

  Paul Rogerson (CW Energy)

• Economics view: One and done… and done again
  Duncan Weldon (economist and author)