To ask His Majesty's Government, further to data released by the Office for National Statistics on 13 December showing that the economy shrank by more than expected in October, what steps they are taking to boost economic activity.
Answered on
21 December 2023
The government has consistently backed the UK’s growth potential and is meeting the PM’s pledge to grow the economy without fuelling inflation and providing the foundation to get debt falling. The CX announced a major growth package at Spring Budget 2023 and the Autumn Statement built on this, with measures to boost economic activity. The combined impact of the Autumn and Spring policy packages is a permanent 0.5% increase in the level of potential output by the end of the OBR’s forecast and an increase in the number of people in work by around 200,000 by the end of the forecast. The measures could also boost business investment by around £20 billion per year in a decade's time.
Key measures include:
- the largest ever cut to employee and self-employed National Insurance – a tax cut worth over £9bn per year
- a new offer of 30 hours free childcare for eligible working parents, part of the comprehensive £7 billion employment package at Spring Budget 2023 and, building on this at Autumn Statement 2023, a Back to Work Plan, supported by over £2.5 billion in funding over the next five years to help people look for and stay in work, manage their health conditions, and stem the flow into sickness related inactivity
- making full expensing permanent, the biggest business tax cut over a 5 year period in modern British history – worth over £10bn a year
- removing barriers to business investment, for example by reforming our inefficient planning system, and catalysing the UK’s growth industries of the future, for example by making £4.5bn available for strategic manufacturing sectors over five years.