Our chart this week is based on the latest population projections for the UK, with an expected 67% increase in the number of people over the age of 75 and a fall in the number under the age of 25 over the next quarter of a century.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) released 2020-based interim population projections on 12 January 2022 providing an insight into how the population of the UK is expected to change over the next 100 years. They are interim because they don’t include the results of the 2021 Census (which is still being worked on), but they do reflect updated assumptions from the 2018-based projections.
The main differences from the previous projections are a lower fertility rate (revised down from 1.78 to 1.59 per woman) reducing the numbers of births significantly, and slight reductions in anticipated life expectancy (from 82.8 years to 82.2 for males and from 85.7 to 85.3 for females) increasing the number of deaths. This has been partly offset by an increase in net annual long-term international migration from 190,000 a year to 205,000 a year, with a central projection last time of 72.8m people in 2045 revised down to 71.0m. The population is then expected to gradually increase to a peak of 71.8m in 2081, before declining back to 71.0m in 2120.
Our chart focuses on the first 25 years of the projections, illustrating how each generation is expected to change over that time. Overall, the estimated population of 67.1m in June 2020 is expected to change by 16.6m births (an average of around 665,000 a year) less 18.0m deaths (720,000 a year), which would result in a fall of 1.4m (55,000 a year) to 65.7m in 2045, at least before taking into account the effects of migration. Estimated net immigration of 5.3m (230,000 a year until 2026, then 205,000 a year) is expected to mean that the population will instead increase, reaching 71.0m in 2045.
There were an estimated 19.8m 0-24 year-olds in 2020, but in a quarter of a century they will all be in the 25-49 age group and so those under 25 will be formed from the 16.6m projected to be born in the 25 years from 2020, which after around 65,000 deaths would be 16.5m before taking account of migration. Some will leave the country and others will arrive, with a projected 1.5m net addition to take the total to 18.0m in 2045, a reduction of 1.8m compared with the previous cohort.
For the 19.8m under-25s in 2020 moving up a cohort to the 25-49 age group in 2045, deaths of 0.2m would reduce this to 19.6m before taking account of net inward migration of 2.8m to get to a projected 22.4m. This is a net increase of 0.6m compared with the previous generation of 21.8m. That generation, which would be aged 50-74 a quarter of a century later, would be reduced by 1.7m deaths to arrive at 20.1m before adding a net 0.8m from migration to get to 20.9m, a 1.2m increase over the 19.7m who were aged 50-74 in 2020.
A much greater proportion of this cohort will not be around in 2045, with a projected 10.2m deaths reducing numbers to 9.5m before adding 0.2m from net inward migration to arrive at a projected total of 9.7m. This is a 67% increase over the current generation of over-75s of 5.8m, with all bar the 38,000 expected to be over 100 in 2045 expected to have passed on, barring major developments in medical science. This compares with the approximately 15,000 people over the age of 100 in 2020.
Overall the rate of increase in the UK population is expected to fall from an estimated 0.4% a year in 2020 to 0.15% by 2045, an average of 0.2% over the coming quarter of a century. This compares with growth rates of 0.6% to 0.8% a year experienced in the last couple of decades, which has been a key driver of economic growth in that time.
The substantial increase in the numbers aged 75 and over is of course a hugely positive development as more people live much longer lives than in previous generations. However, this will have huge implications for the public finances given the cost implications of providing health services, social care and pensions to older generations, particularly those over the age of 75. With proportionately fewer workers (even with planned increases in the retirement age) this is expected to drive higher levels of taxation over the next quarter of a century without much higher levels of economic growth than are currently anticipated.
Fortunately a quarter of a century provides opportunity for governments to address the financial challenges posed by our success in extending lives if they are willing to do so, even with the added debt arising from the pandemic, which is why ICAEW continues to argue for the development of a long-term fiscal strategy to put the public finances on a sustainable path. Such a strategy could make a significant difference to the prosperity of future generations.
Our first chart of 2022 highlights how the cost of government borrowing remains extremely low for most of the 21 largest economies in the world, despite the huge expansion in public debt driven by the pandemic.
Our chart of the week illustrates how borrowing costs are still at historically low rates for most of the 21 largest national economies in the world, with negative yields on 10-year government bonds on 5 January 2022 for Germany (-0.13%) and Switzerland (-0.07%), approximately zero for the Netherlands, and yields of sub-2.5% for Japan (0.09%), France (0.23%), Spain (0.60%), the UK (1.08%), Italy (1.23%), Canada (1.59%), the USA (1.65%), Australia (1.79%) and South Korea (2.38%).
This is despite the trillions added to public debt burdens across the world over the past couple of years as a consequence of the pandemic, including the $5trn added to US government debt since March 2020 (up from $17.6trn to $22.6trn owed to external parties) and the more than £500bn borrowed by the UK government (public sector net debt up from £1.8trn to £2.3trn) for example.
Yields in developing economies are higher, although China (2.82%) and Poland (3.87%) can borrow at much lower rates than Indonesia (6.38%), India (6.51%), Mexico (8.03%), Russia (8.37%) and Brazil (10.73%). The outlier is Turkey (24.21%), which is experiencing some difficult economic conditions at the moment. Data was not available for Saudi Arabia, the 19th or 20th largest economy in the world, which has net cash reserves.
With inflation higher than it has been for several years, real borrowing rates are negative for most developed countries, meaning that in theory it would make sense for most countries to continue to borrow as much as they can while funding is so cheap. However, in practice fiscal discipline appears to be reasserting itself, with Germany, for example, planning on returning to a fully balanced budget by the start of next year and the UK targeting a current budget surplus within three years.
For many policymakers, the concern is not so much about how easy it is to borrow today, but the prospect of higher interest rates multiplied by much higher levels of debt eating into spending budgets just as they are looking to invest to grow their economies over the rest of the decade. Despite that, with the pandemic still raging and an emerging cost of living crisis, there may well be a temptation to borrow ‘just one more time’ to support struggling households over what is likely to be a difficult start to 2022.
While November’s deficit of £17.4bn is in line with expectations, public sector net debt is up by more than half a trillion pounds since the start of the pandemic and as a proportion of GDP, debt is the highest it has been since March 1963.
The public sector finances for November 2021 released on Tuesday 21 December reported a monthly deficit of £17.4bn – £4.8bn lower than the £22.2bn reported for November 2020 but £11.8bn higher than the £5.6bn deficit reported for November 2019.
This brings the cumulative deficit for the first eight months of the financial year to £136.0bn compared with £251.7bn and £52.5bn for the same period last year and the year before that respectively.
Public sector net debt increased from £2,283.0bn at the end of October to £2,317.7bn or 96.1% of GDP at the end of November. This is £183.3bn higher than at the start of the financial year and an increase of £524.6bn over March 2020. As a proportion of GDP, debt is the highest it has been since March 1963, almost 60 years ago.
The increase in public sector net debt of £34.7bn in the month reflects borrowing to finance the deficit of £17.4bn and £26.9bn in the final tranche of the Bank of England’s Term Funding Scheme, offset by repayments in coronavirus lending as well as other net movements.
As in previous months this financial year, the deficit came in below the forecast for 2021-22 prepared by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) in March 2021 but was in line with the OBR’s revised forecast issued in October 2021 alongside the Autumn Budget and Spending Review 2021.
Cumulative receipts in the first eight months of the 2021-22 financial year amounted to £560.7bn, £71.4bn or 15% higher than a year previously, but only £31.2bn or 6% above the level seen a year before that in 2019-20. At the same time cumulative expenditure excluding interest of £622.7bn was £44.4bn or 7% lower than the first eight months of 2020-21, but £102.1bn or 20% higher than the same period two years ago.
Interest amounted to £44.2bn in the eight months to October 2021, £14.6bn or 49% higher than the same period in 2020-21, principally because of higher inflation affecting index-linked gilts. Despite debt being 29% higher than two years ago, interest costs were only £5.0bn or 13% more than the equivalent eight months ended 30 November 2019.
Cumulative net public sector investment in the eight months to November 2021 was £29.8bn. This was £14.5bn less than the £44.3bn reported for the first eight months of last year, which included around £17bn or so of coronavirus lending that is not expected to be recovered. Investment was £7.6bn or 34% more than two years ago, principally reflecting a higher level of capital expenditure, in particular on investment in HS2.
Debt increased by £183.3bn since the start of the financial year, £47.3bn more than the deficit. This reflects funding to cover outflows on lending, including to banks through the Term Funding Scheme, lending to businesses through the British Business Bank, and student loans, offset by the receipt of taxes deferred last year and the repayment of coronavirus loans taken out during the pandemic.
Commenting on the figures Alison Ring, ICAEW Public Sector and Taxation Director, said: “While the numbers for November are in line with expectations, it’s notable that debt has risen both in cash terms and as a proportion of GDP, and at 96.1% is the highest it has been for almost 60 years. The monthly deficit of £17.4bn is below the peaks of last year but still substantially above the pre-pandemic position.
“Despite the rise in interest rates earlier this month, the Chancellor is still able to take advantage of historically-low borrowing costs if he wants to provide support to businesses adversely affected by the Omicron variant and prevent further scarring to the economy. His concern will be how to do so without stoking inflation, which is expected to head even higher over the next few months.”
Caution is needed with respect to the numbers published by the ONS, which are expected to be repeatedly revised as estimates are refined and gaps in the underlying data are filled.
The ONS made a number of revisions to prior month and prior year fiscal numbers to reflect revisions to estimates. These had the effect of decreasing the reported fiscal deficit for the seven months to October 2021 from £127.3bn to £118.6bn and the deficit for the year ended 31 March 2021 from £323.1bn to £321.9bn.
As 2021 draws to a close, our chart this week looks back on a rocky couple of years for UK international trade which has endured Brexit complications and the global COVID-19 pandemic.
Our chart of the week illustrates how Brexit and COVID-19 have combined to create a rocky couple of years for UK exports and imports of goods and services, reflecting the trials and tribulations of the Brexit process as well as the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on trade since the first lockdown last year.
The monthly trade total (exports + imports) increased from £92bn (£45bn + £47bn) in October 2014 to a peak of £123bn (£57bn + £65bn) in March 2019 at the height of Brexit ‘no deal’ preparations before falling back to £113bn (£54bn + £59bn) the following month before peaking again at £122bn (£61bn + £62bn) in October 2020 ahead of the end of the transition period. Following the introduction of new trading arrangements and the run-down of inventories, trade fell to a low of £86bn (£47bn + £39bn) in May 2020 during the first lockdown before recovering to £111bn (£52bn + £59bn) in December 2020. Trade fell back to £93bn (£45bn + £48bn) in January 2020 before growing back to £104bn (£51bn + £53bn) in July 2021 where it has appeared to stabilise with similar monthly totals in September and October 2021.
The chart provides only a hint of the challenges that have faced both importers and exporters over the past couple of years as they have had to navigate new trading arrangements with our European neighbours just as the pandemic has caused massive disruption across the planet. Imports and exports to EU countries have both fallen, but the EU still remains the UK’s principal trading partner, comprising almost half of the UK’s trade in goods for example.
The stabilisation in trade flows in the last few months for which statistics are available may be a hopeful sign, but with greater customs checks on the imports of goods from the UK coming into force in January, and the continuing evolution of the pandemic, the position is still very uncertain.
This is our last chart of the week for 2021 and so we would like to take this opportunity to wish you all the best for a safe and enjoyable Christmas break and for a healthy and prosperous 2022. We look forward to seeing you again in the new year.
My chart this week is on Bounce Back Loans, one of the principal sources of financial support for businesses during the first year of the pandemic and the subject of a recent investigation by the National Audit Office.
The recent publication of the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) accounts for 2020-21 contained an assessment of the losses expected on the financial provided to businesses through the Bounce Back Loan Scheme (BBLS), the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS), the Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CLBILS) and the Future Fund. This was followed by an updated report from the National Audit Office (NAO) on the administration of the scheme and the potential losses to the taxpayers.
The largest of these schemes was BBLS, with Bounce Back Loans of up to £50,000 provided to eligible businesses to help them weather the first lockdown in the second quarter of 2020, before being extended to the whole of the 2020-21 financial year. In the end, around a quarter of businesses took out a Bounce Back Loan, comprising 1.5m loans for a total of £47bn at an interest rate of 2.5% repayable over six years. The interest in the first year was covered by the government, with no repayments due in that period.
Businesses can extend the loans to ten years through the Pay As Your Grow option, as well as being allowed up to one six month payment holiday and three interest-only payments to provide flexibility without going into default.
The seven main UK banks provided around 90% of the loans by value, with the rest provided by other banks and non-bank lenders, such as peer-to-peer lenders. Each participating financial institution was provided with a 100% guarantee by the government to cover any amounts not repaid. Half a million or nearly 35% of the loans were for the maximum amount of £50,000 (adding up to £27bn) with £18bn lent out between £10,000 and £50,000 and £2bn lent for amounts between £2,000 (the minimum possible) and £10,000.
As the chart illustrates, the geographical distribution of loans was weighted towards the south and centre of England, with £11bn borrowed by businesses in London, £10bn in the South (£6.5bn South East and £3.6bn South West) and £11bn in the Midlands & East (£3.8bn West Midlands, £2.9bn East Midlands and £4.5bn East of England), a total of £32bn. The balance of £15bn was split between £9bn in the North (£3.2bn Yorkshire & the Humber, £4.8bn North West and £1.3bn North East) and £6bn in the other nations of the UK (£2.7bn Scotland, £1.6bn Wales and £1.3bn Northern Ireland).
More than 90% of the loans, amounting to £40bn, went to micro-businesses, ie businesses with turnover below £632,000.
BEIS have estimated in their 2020-21 financial statements that they do not expect 37% of the loans with a value of £17bn to be repaid, comprising £12bn in estimated bad debts and £5bn in estimated losses from fraud, although the NAO says that these numbers are highly uncertain at this stage. With £2bn already repaid, this leaves £28bn believed to be recoverable over the remainder of the six years of the loans (or 10 years for those that are extended).
The fraud estimate, for 11% of the loans with a value of £4.9bn, was based on a sample of 1,067 loans as at 31 March 2021, but a subsequent analysis in October 2021 suggests that the level of fraud may be lower at around 7.5% of loans and so there is some hope that BEIS and the British Business Bank will be able to reduce the amount they will have to reimburse to participating banks under the 100% guarantees.
However, as the NAO reports, these guarantees mean participating banks have no financial incentive to chase repayment and it has raised concerns that insufficient resources are being dedicated by BEIS and the British Business Bank to recovering outstanding amounts.
The challenge for government is that many businesses have not been able to get back to their pre-pandemic level of operation and so there is a need to be sensitive, whilst at the same time seeking to protect public money and tackle those who made fraudulent claims.
My chart this week looks at how the number of employees on UK payrolls has been supported by the furlough scheme, with more people employed in October 2021 than before the pandemic.
Concerns that the end of the furlough scheme in September 2021 would be followed by a sharp rise in unemployment proved to be unfounded, with the flash estimate of the number of people on UK payrolls increasing to 29.4m in October 2021, an increase of 166,000 from the previous month and greater than before the pandemic. This is positive news as it suggests that the majority of the 1.1m still on the furlough scheme when it ended on 30 September 2021 have been able to retain their jobs or have found work elsewhere.
The chart shows how payrolled employees increased gradually before the pandemic from 27.7m in October 2015 to 28.1m in October 2016, 28.5m in October 2017, 28.8m in October 2018 and 29.0m in October 2019, peaking in November 2019 at 29.1m. Numbers fell to 28.9m in February 2020 although on a seasonally adjusted basis the numbers increased slightly. Those in work fell significantly by the end of March 2020 to 22.0m when 6.8m were placed on furlough under the government’s Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) and to 19.7m at the end of April 2020 when 8.8m were on furlough.
Despite the furlough scheme overall payrolled numbers fell during the pandemic from 28.9m in March 2020 (including 6.8m on furlough) to 28.2m in October 2020 (when 2.4m were on furlough) to 28.0m at its lowest in January and February 2021 (when 4.9m and 4.7m were on furlough), before gradually rising to 29.2m in September 2021 (when 1.1m were on furlough) and 29.4m in October 2021 (when no one was on furlough).
Although the flash numbers for October 2021 are provisional and subject to change, they should be sufficiently reliable for policy makers to take some comfort that the furlough scheme has done its job in stabilising the economy and avoiding significant levels of unemployment. However, with the pandemic still not over, there will be concerns about whether growth in employment can be maintained over the coming months.
According to the ONS, the median monthly pay in October 2021 was £2,005, slightly down on the £2,010 reported for September 2021, but an increase of 4.9% compared with the £1,911 calculated for October 2020. The latter compares with consumer price inflation of 4.2% over the same period.
The idea that we might be emerging from the pandemic with higher levels of employment and wages than before it started might have seemed unlikely at the start of the first lockdown. But then at an estimated total cost of £370bn, of which £70bn was for the CJRS, the eye watering sums incurred by the government in getting to this position have been far from insubstantial.
The monthly public sector deficit was flat at £18.8bn in October but a last-minute rush by banks to access cheap finance caused public sector net debt to jump by £68.7bn to £2,277.6bn.
The public sector finances for October 2021 released on Friday 18 November reported a monthly deficit of £18.8bn, slightly better than the £19.0bn reported for October 2020 but higher than the £11.6bn deficit in October 2019.
This brings the cumulative deficit for the first seven months of the financial year to £127.3bn compared with £230.7bn last year and £46.9bn for the equivalent period two years ago.
Public sector net debt increased from £2,208.9bn at the end of September to £2,277.6bn or 95.1% of GDP at the end of October. This is £141.8bn higher than at the start of the financial year and an increase of £484.5bn over March 2020.
The increase in public sector net debt of £68.7bn in the month includes £57.3bn to funding lending to banks who rushed to borrow under the ‘Term Funding Scheme with additional incentives for SMEs’ (TFSME) before the extended drawdown period ended on 31 October 2021. A further £26.9bn will be recorded in November for cash movements after the cut-off date, bringing the total amount financed through the TFSME to £193.4bn on 10 November 2021.
As in previous months this financial year, the deficit came in below the forecast for 2021-22 prepared by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) in March 2021 but was in line with the OBR’s revised forecast issued in October 2021 alongside the Autumn Budget and Spending Review 2021.
Cumulative receipts in the first seven months of the 2021-22 financial year amounted to £489.0bn, £65.7bn or 16% higher than a year previously, but only £23.7bn or 5% above the level seen a year before that in 2019-20. At the same time cumulative expenditure excluding interest of £548.2bn was £39.3bn or 7% lower than the first seven months of 2020-21, but £92.5bn or 20% higher than the same period two years ago.
Interest amounted to £39.3bn in the seven months to October 2021, £14.2bn or 57% higher than the same period in 2020-21, principally because of higher inflation affecting index-linked gilts. Despite debt being 24% higher than two years ago, interest costs were only £2.6bn or 7% more than the equivalent seven months ended 31 October 2019.
Cumulative net public sector investment in the seven months to October 2021 was £28.8bn. This was £12.6bn less than the £41.4bn in the first seven months of last year, which included around £17bn on coronavirus lending that is not expected to be recovered. Investment was £9.0bn or 45% more than two years ago, principally reflecting a higher level of capital expenditure.
Debt increased by £141.8bn since the start of the financial year, £14.5bn more than the deficit. This reflects funding to cover outflows on lending to business, including to banks through the Term Funding Scheme, and student loans offset by the receipt of taxes deferred last year and the repayment of coronavirus loans taken out during the course of the pandemic.
Alison Ring, ICAEW Public Sector Director, said: “Today’s public finance numbers show a deficit of £18.8bn in October, which is in line with the revised forecasts published by the Office for Budget Responsibility last month. The deficit has stopped growing now that the furlough and other pandemic support schemes have finished.
“However, a last-minute rush by banks to obtain cheap loans for small and medium enterprises, before the application deadline on 31 October, caused government debt to jump by £68.7bn last month. These loans should help businesses navigate choppy economic waters with rapidly rising inflation, as well as supply chain and staffing challenges. Nonetheless, the Chancellor will need to continue watching events closely to see if he will need to reintroduce any pandemic support schemes.”
Caution is needed with respect to the numbers published by the ONS, which are expected to be repeatedly revised as estimates are refined and gaps in the underlying data are filled.
The ONS made a number of revisions to prior month and prior year fiscal numbers to reflect revisions to estimates. These had the effect of increasing the reported fiscal deficit for the six months to September 2021 from £108.1bn to £108.5bn and the deficit for the year ended 31 March 2021 from £319.9bn to £323.1bn.
My chart this week looks at how price rises have accelerated over the last few months, with consumer price inflation reaching 4.2% in October, the highest it has been for a decade.
The Office for National Statistics published its latest estimates for inflation on Wednesday 17 November, reporting a 12-month increase in the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) of 4.2% and a 12-month increase in the Consumer Prices Index including owner occupiers’ house costs (CPIH) of 3.8%, both of which are the highest they have been since November 2011 when CPI was 4.8% and CPIH was 4.1%.
CPI and CPIH are calculated using a basket of goods and services to assess the level of inflation experienced by consumers, with the current index set to 100 in July 2015.
The ICAEW chart of the week shows how CPI fell before increasing from 106.7 in October 2018 to 107.6 in April 2019 and 108.3 in October 2019, an annual increase of 1.5% that was within the 1% to 3% Bank of England target range. This was followed by smaller increases to 108.3 in April 2020 and 109.1 in October 2020, a 0.7% annual increase in CPI driven in part by the pandemic. The index hovered around that level for several months until starting to increase more rapidly from March onwards as the economy started to re-open, reaching 110.1 in April 2021 and continuing to increase sharply to 113.6 in October 2021, an annual increase of 4.2%.
The Governor of the Bank of England is required to write to the Chancellor of the Bank of England whenever inflation is more than 1% above or below the 2% target and he did so on 23 September when inflation reached 3.2% and he will again now that it has reached 4.2%. Part of the explanation he has given and will give are ‘base effects’, where price discounting during 2020 at the height of the first and second waves of the pandemic suppressed some of the inflation that is being experienced now.
Further letters are likely over the next few months as even if prices don’t rise any further, given how the index bounced around the 109 level between September and March 2021. This means inflation should continue to stay substantially above 3% for the next four months or so unless prices were to fall again, which is unlikely given how global commodities and supply constraints continue to feed into rising domestic prices. A 12-month CPI-inflation rate of 5% appears more than likely at some point in the next few months.
The Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) isn’t panicking at this stage given that the annualised rate of inflation over the last three years (comparing October 2021 with October 2018) is an almost on-target 2.1% and their expectation that inflation rate will come down once the flat inflationary period of a year ago starts to drop out of the comparison. However, they are sufficiently concerned about the steep slope in the CPI in the last few months to signal that interest rates may need to rise if prices continue to increase at the pace seen in recent months.
The MPC’s original plan was to hang tight through what they hoped would be a short inflationary spurt as the economy emerges from the pandemic. In the event it looks like they won’t be able to hold that line, with higher interest rates a distinct possibility in the coming months.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak found some extra money to supplement the Spending Review 2021, turning a very tough settlement for government departments into a moderately tough one.
The Chancellor had already announced an increase in the health budget from the proceeds of the health and social care levy, but as highlighted by our chart last week, this implied a very tough budget settlement for most other departments, including cuts for some. Instead, Rishi Sunak was able to use some of the upward revisions in the economic forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility to add to departmental resource budgets, ensuring that each department receives a real term spending increase in their combined resource and capital budgets even with higher levels of inflation in the coming year.
However, there was a sting in the tail, as supplementary COVID-19 funding ceases at the end of this financial year, leaving departments to absorb further COVID-related expenditure within their budgets from next April onwards. This will include catching up on backlogs built up during the pandemic in addition to any incremental costs that may continue into the Spending Review period.
The chart starts by highlighting how departmental resource and capital budgets of £346bn and £70bn in 2019-20, increased to £355bn and £88bn in 2020-21 and to £385bn and £99bn in the current year. This is before £127bn in COVID-19 supplementary budgets last year and £70bn this year.
The Spending Review period itself covers the three financial years 2022-23, 2023-24 and 2024-25, with the combination of funding from the health and social care levy and the Spending Review seeing departmental resource budgets increase to £435bn, £443bn and £454bn respectively. This is more than the spending envelope originally set out by the Chancellor last month.
Capital investment budgets remained broadly unchanged at £107bn, £111bn and £112bn respectively, continuing the significant jump from the £70bn invested in 2019-20 in the coming financial year before flattening out in the following two years.
Over the three years, the resource budget settlement implies annualised average real terms growth in the health & social care budget of 4.1% and in the education budget of 2.2%, while the defence budget is broadly frozen in cash terms and cut by 1.4% in real terms. This assumes average inflation over the three years of 2.2%, with higher inflation in the coming financial year offset by much lower rates in the following two years.
Other departments are expected to grow by 3.1% on average over the period, with central funding for local government up 9.4%, transport up 6.8%, work & pensions up 4.6% and justice up 4.1%, each receiving larger relative settlements than other departments. International trade (+0.1%), HM Treasury (+0.9%), levelling up, housing & communities (+1.1%), HMRC (+1.2%), the Cabinet Office (+1.4%), business, energy & industrial strategy (+1.4%), and intelligence (+1.7%) are the departments receiving increases below 2% a year on average.
2021-22 £bn
2022-23 £bn
2023-24 £bn
2023-24 £bn
Average real-terms growth
Education
147.1
167.9
173.4
177.4
+4.1%
Defence
70.7
77.0
79.0
80.6
+2.2%
Transport
31.5
32.4
32.2
32.2
-1.4%
Large departments
249.3
277.3
284.6
290.2
+2.9%
Other departments
70.7
83.9
82.7
82.7
+3.1%
Devolved administrations
56.8
63.0
64.3
65.3
+2.5%
ODA to 0.7% of GDP
–
–
–
5.2
Reserves
8.1
11.0
10.9
10.3
Total excluding covid-19
384.9
435.2
442.5
453.7
+3.3%
HM Treasury, ‘Autumn Budget and Spending Review 2021’
The above growth rates exclude capital budgets, expected to increase in real terms by 1.9% a year on average over the three years of the Spending Review. Departments benefiting from higher capital budgets include small and independent bodies (+16.8%), FCDO (+16.0%), digital, culture, media & sport (+11.8%), and intelligence (+9.1%), albeit mostly from relatively small bases in each case. The 3.8% average real terms increase in health & social care capital investment is much less proportionately, but much larger in cash terms.
Perhaps just as important as the monetary amounts provided to departments as the Chancellor opened his proverbial cheque book, is the certainty that a three-year budgetary settlement provides. This will help departments plan ahead with confidence and hopefully help them obtain better value for the money they spend on our behalf.
The Chancellor used tax rises to start repairing the public finances but spending pressures could derail his hopes for a pre-election tax giveaway in 2023 or 2024. Wednesday’s Autumn Budget and Spending Review saw total public spending settle permanently above a trillion pounds a year, as additional spending increases more than offset the end of temporary COVID-19 interventions.
A ‘Boris Budget’ – full of fizz and capital spending announcements
Despite Rishi Sunak’s avowed commitment to a small state and low taxes, the Autumn Budget reality featured both higher taxes and higher spending, and the Spending Review focused on addressing the many pressures bearing down on public services.
The Chancellor benefited from a faster rebound in the economy due to the vaccination programme, as well as being helped by the time lag between inflation benefiting the revenue line and when it starts to feed through into public spending. Combined with the health and social care levy and other tax rises, this provided him with the budgetary capacity to increase spending on health, reverse previously announced cuts in departmental spending, and still reduce borrowing.
This led the Resolution Foundation to label this a ‘Boris Budget’, reflecting the reputedly more generous instincts of Prime Minister Boris Johnson as compared with his Chancellor.
The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR)’s high-level analysis was that the Chancellor used around half the £50bn net benefit from forecast revisions and tax rises in 2022-23 to increase spending, with the balance reducing the deficit from £107bn to £83bn. However, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) points out that, apart from health and social care, the additional spending mostly reversed planned cuts made during the November 2020 and March 2021 Budgets that were always going to be difficult to achieve in practice.
The good news from better economic forecasts, including the OBR’s revision of its estimate of the permanent scarring effect on the economy from 3% to 2%, was offset by concerns over the impact of inflation on living standards and the impact of the ending of the temporary uplift in universal credit on those on low incomes.
Higher inflation will also put public sector budgets under pressure as higher wage settlements and supplier costs start to eat into the spending increases awarded as part of the Spending Review. Clearing backlogs built up over the course of the pandemic will absorb further amounts, while there is also a risk that construction worker shortages and rising construction costs will make it difficult to deliver on the capital programmes announced in such a flurry over the weekend before the Budget announcement.
Unemployment – the dog that didn’t bark
One of the key reasons for the better economic situation than was expected at the start of the pandemic is that unemployment has not gone up significantly. The contribution of the furlough schemes and business support has been hugely significant to this outcome, not only by supporting workers and businesses during successive lockdowns but more importantly preserving businesses and the jobs for workers to return to as pandemic restrictions have been lifted.
Unemployment may still increase following the ending of the furlough schemes in September, but any increase is likely to be significantly smaller than the potential more than doubling in unemployment rates that some had anticipated at the start of the first lockdown.
Modest tax reforms overshadowed by higher tax rates, fiscal drag and a major ‘tax’ cut
Perhaps the most radical ‘tax’ change announced in the Autumn Budget was not a formal tax at all. The reduction in the universal credit taper rate from 63% to 55% is in effect a significant tax cut on those on the lowest incomes, even if it still leaves poorer households on higher effective marginal rates than those earning over £150,000 a year. It also does not make up for the removal of the temporary £20 a week boost to universal credit that has already started to hit many of the poorest households this month.
Higher inflation benefits the public finances by increasing fiscal drag as tax allowances reduce in value in real terms, bringing more people into the scope of income tax or onto higher tax bands. This is a hidden tax increase that brings in more for the government without it needing to increase headline rates.
Of course, the government did that as well. The headline rates of employee national insurance, employer national insurance and dividend tax were increased by 1.25% in the coming year, even if in subsequent years the health and social care levy will appear on payslips and PAYE statements as a separate tax in its own right.
Modest reforms to business rates (principally more frequent revaluations), alcohol duties, and air passenger duties were relatively light touch compared with the previously announced health and social care levy and the planned 6% increase in the main corporation tax rate, even if banks saw a reduction of 5% in the bank levy on corporate profits to offset some of that increase.
More money for health and the criminal justice system, but less for the armed forces
The Spending Review saw extra money for health (funded by the new health and social care levy) where demographic pressures continue to drive demand in addition to dealing with the costs of the pandemic and the backlog of treatments that have built up.
The criminal justice system also received a substantial settlement (4.1% on average over three years), but this will not be sufficient to restore spending to the level before austerity. Indeed, the IFS has calculated that with the exception of the Department for Health & Social Care, the Home Office and the Department for Education, all other departments will continue to spend less in real terms than they did in 2009-10.
One surprise in the detail was the flat current spending settlement for the Ministry of Defence over the coming three years, implying a further cut in spending in real terms on the armed forces, which are expected to contract even further than they have done already. While equipment spending is up as part of a ‘more drones, fewer soldiers’ policy, this is one area where additional settlements in the next couple of Budgets appear more likely than not.
Higher levels of capital investment targeted at boosting regional economic growth
A big credit to the Chancellor is that despite the many challenges facing the public finances following the pandemic he has not scaled back the government’s capital investment programme. While it is the case that his two immediate predecessors pencilled in the substantial increases that we are now seeing, it is the current Chancellor who is delivering on them. There are significant boosts in investment in economic infrastructure, housing, research & development and digitising government amongst other areas.
Open questions remain in areas such as transport, where the long-awaited Integrated Rail Plan was not published with the Spending Review as expected. However, the £7bn pre-announced for regional rail upgrades demonstrates how much can be done with a bigger pot of money for investment.
The step-change in the level in capital budgets – from £70bn in 2019-20 to £107bn in 2022-23 is remarkable. The one concern will be whether the relatively flat capital budget allocations in subsequent years will mean investment starts to fall in real terms again, possibly ‘pulling the plug’ on the economic benefits of investment just as the economy recovers from the pandemic.
New fiscal rules: a cautious approach to repairing the public finances
The Chancellor announced two new fiscal rules: a current budget balance target and a declining debt to GDP ratio; although they were accompanied by subsidiary rules, including a 3% of GDP cap on investment spending and a commitment to return overseas development assistance to 0.7% of GDP once budget balance is achieved.
In effect, they provide a fiscally conservative framework of generating sufficient tax revenues to cover day-to-day spending, while allowing a certain amount of borrowing for investment. While debt should still grow – and is expected to reach over £2.5tn during the forecast period, the debt to GDP ratio should start to fall as the economy grows over time.
These changes confirm that George Osborne’s ambition to eliminate the fiscal deficit completely has been abandoned, replaced by a Gordon Brown-style current budget balance target. This is calculated under the statistics-based National Accounts fiscal framework, which for example excludes the long-term cost of public sector pensions; the government is still planning to continue to lose money on an accounting basis under IFRS.
The forward-looking current-budget balance accompanies the Chancellor’s other principal fiscal rule with is to reduce the ratio of public sector net debt to GDP, although again this uses a target based on fiscal measures that do not include other liabilities in the public sector balance sheet.
Even there, the Chancellor adopted a non-GASP (non-Generally Accepted Statistical Practice) measure to target (public sector net debt excluding the Bank of England) that excludes some central bank liabilities, which rather strangely means that money used to finance premiums paid to private investors for gilts purchased by the Bank of England is excluded from the formal fiscal targets.
Irrespective of the precise KPIs used in the fiscal rules, the overall approach is one of repairing the public finances gradually over time. Higher rates of economic growth would enable that to be accelerated, but the government has as yet been unable to identify how to get back onto the pre-financial crisis levels of productivity improvements that would be required to make this possible. In the meantime, the fiscal rules provide a framework in which tax rises to fund public spending are more likely, in particular to fund increases in the health, social care and the state pension costs driven by more people living longer.
There are many risks to the Chancellor keeping to his fiscal rules over the forecast period, especially as there is relatively little headroom within the current forecasts according to the OBR and the IFS. There are also risks from recessions over a longer period.
A weaker but more transparent public balance sheet
The pandemic has seen the liability side of the public balance sheet rise significantly, with £2.2tn rising to £2.5tn in debt adding to similar amounts of liabilities for public sector pensions and other obligations including nuclear decommissioning and clinical negligence.
Higher gearing in a balance sheet already in negative territory increases the exposure of the public finances to changes in interest rates and inflation, providing a higher risk profile for the public finances. For example, the OBR has estimated that a 1% increase in interest rates would add £25bn to interest costs each year – approaching more than twice the amount raised by the health and social care levy.
One positive aspect of the Autumn Budget and Spending Review announcement was a greater amount of balance sheet analysis, providing improved insights into how the government is managing the public balance sheet and into the risks facing the public finances. This includes much more granular detail on contingent liabilities.
Pre-election tax cuts have been promised, but will they happen?
The Chancellor was very clear in telling his backbenchers and the country that he would like to cut taxes before the next election, demonstrating his and the government’s commitment to lowering taxes.
For many commentators, this seemed a contradictory statement to make at the same time as presenting a fiscal event where the government is in the process of raising taxes to their highest level since the 1950s.
In practice, the Chancellor has some capacity to cut taxes based on the current forecasts and he will be hoping that the post-pandemic recovery is better than anticipated, enabling him to be even more generous.
However, as our recent article on the long-term pressures facing the public finances highlighted, the prospects of reversing the entirety of recent tax increases are remote. Long-term fiscal pressures continue to imply higher taxes will be needed absent much stronger economic growth than is anticipated, while there are plenty of economic storm clouds on the horizon including a potential cost-of-living crisis this winter.
