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Chancellor Rishi Sunak has set out what the UK government will spend on health, education, transport and other public services next year.
In a statement in Parliament, he also briefed MPs about the state of the UK economy and the latest forecasts for the UK’s public finances, which have been battered by the Covid pandemic.
Here are the main points.
- Millions of public sector workers will see their pay frozen next year
- A million NHS workers and those earning less than £24,000 will still get increase
- The UK economy is expected to shrink by 11.5% this year
- Unemployment is expected to reach 7.5% next spring, with 2.6m people out of work
- Overseas aid budget is to be cut by about £5bn
- A new £4bn “levelling up” fund will pay for upgrading local infrastructure
Public sector pay
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- Millions of public sector workers will see their pay frozen next year
- But more than two million earning less than £24,000 a year will get a minimum £250 increase
- More than a million doctors, nurses and NHS workers will also see rise
- National Living wage to rise by 2.2% to £8.91 an hour
- 23 and 24-year olds will qualify for living wage for first time
State of the economy
image copyrightPA- Economy will have contracted 11.3% in 2020, the largest fall for more than 300 years
- Economy forecast to grow by 5.5% next year and by 6.6% in 2022
- Output not expected to return to pre-crisis levels until the fourth quarter of 2022
- Unemployment is expected to reach 7.5% next spring, with 2.6m people out of work
- Borrowing forecast to hit £394bn this year, equivalent to 19% of GDP, the highest ever in peacetime
- UK debt will be equivalent to 91.9% of GDP this year and rise to 97.5% of GDP in 2025/26
- In 2025, the economy will be around 3% smaller than was expected in March Budget forecast
Health and social care
image copyrightPA Media- £18bn for Covid testing, PPE and vaccines
- An extra £3bn for the NHS in England
- £1.5bn to ease existing pressures this winter
- £1bn to tackle treatment backlogs and enable delayed operations to go ahead
- £500m for mental health services in England
- £325m to replace ageing diagnostic equipment like MRI and CT scanners
- £300m extra grant funding for councils for social care
Employment and business
image copyrightPA Media- A new £4.6bn package to help people back to work
- £2.6bn for Restart scheme to support those out of work for 12 months
- £1.6bn for the Kickstart scheme to subsidise jobs for young people
- £375m skills package, including £138m to provide Lifetime Skills Guarantee
- New £4bn “levelling up” fund to finance local infrastructure improvement projects
- New UK infrastructure investment bank to be established in North of England
International aid and defence
image copyrightPA Media- Overseas aid budget to be cut from 0.7% to 0.5% of total national income
- Will see reduction of about £5bn in support for tackling global poverty
- UK will revert to 0.7% target in 2022-23 if the public finances allow
- A multi-billion pound increase in annual defence spending over the next four years, creating 40,000 jobs
- New centre dedicated to artificial intelligence
- National cyber force to counter terrorists, organised crime groups and hostile states
- Defence funding boost ‘extends British influence’
Schools, transport, crime and councils
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image copyrightReuters- £2.2bn extra for schools in England, representing 2.2% increase per pupil
- An extra £2bn for public transport, including subsidies for the rail network
- £3bn in extra funding for local authorities, representing a 4.5% increase in spending power
- £250m for councils to tackle rough sleeping
- £4bn over four years to provide 18,000 new prison places
- More than £400m to recruit 6,000 new police officers by the end of 2022
Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
- £2.6bn for the devolved administrations to boost Covid recovery
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