HOW WILL THE BUDGET AFFECT YOU?

Chancellor Rishi Sunak has set out an extra £65bn in Covid support for employees and businesses - but revealed a freeze on income tax thresholds and a rise in corporation tax to help pay back the UK’s rising debts ...

FURLOUGH

The furlough scheme - which pays 80% of employees’ wages - will be extended until the end of September. After July, businesses will be asked for a

10% contribution, rising to 20% in August and September. Help for the self-employed will be extended with changes meaning 600,000 more people will be eligible.

SPORT

Sports including cricket, tennis and horse racing will benefit from a £300m recovery package, and there will be £25m new funding to support grassroots football - enough to build around 700 new pitches across the UK.

ARTS AND CULTURE

An extra £300m will be added to the government’s £1.57bn Culture Recovery Fund. Museums and cultural bodies in England will also receive £90m to keep going until they can open their doors. There will also be £18.8m for community cultural projects, and £77m allocated for similar initiatives in the devolved nations.

HIGH STREET

£5bn of new grants for hard hit firms - worth up to £6,000 for non-essential retailers and £18,000 for restaurants, pubs, personal care and gym businesses which will reopen later.

CHARITY SUPPORT

Domestic abuse has been one of the ‘hidden tragedies’ of the pandemic and the Chancellor has provided an extra £19m for domestic abuse programmes. He also announced £10m to support veterans with mental health needs and a £40m down payment for victims of the Thalidomide scandal - and a guarantee for future funding.

UNIVERSAL CREDIT

The temporary increase of £20 a week in universal credit will continue for a further six months. The minimum wage will increase to £8.91 per hour from April.

TAX

Personal income tax thresholds will be frozen from next year until 2026 - at £12,570 for the basic rate and at £50,270 for the higher rate, dragging more people into paying taxes. Thresholds for inheritance tax, pensions lifetime allowance and capital gains tax thresholds are also being frozen.

APPRENTICESHIPS

Incentive payments for hiring new apprentices are being doubled to £3,000 while £126m will be invested to triple the number of new traineeships.

CORPORATION TAX

Corporation tax is to increase from 19% to 25% in April 2023. Companies will be able to offset losses against their tax bills going back up to three years, allowing them to claim additional refunds of up to £760,000.

To tackle fraud in COVID support schemes there will be £100m to set up an HMRC taskforce with 1,000 investigators.

LOANS

Bounce-back and other coronavirus loans for businesses will be replaced by a new recovery loan scheme 80% guaranteed by the government.

EXPORTS AND IMPORTS

Eight freeports - special economic zones with different rules to make it cheaper and easier to do businesses - have been announced at: East Midlands airport; Felixstowe and Harwich; Humber; Liverpool city region; Plymouth; Solent; Thames; and Teesside.

BUSINESS RATES

The business rates holiday for retail, hospitality and leisure sector businesses has been extended to the end of June and for the remaining nine months of the fiscal year they will still be discounted by up to two thirds.

VACCINATION

As Covid-19 vaccinations keep rolling out, an extra £1.65bn will be allocated to help the government reach its target of offering a first dose to every adult by July 31. Some of the money will be used for a trial to see if different vaccine doses can be mixed.

HOSPITALITY AND TOURISM

Reduced rate of 5% VAT for the hospitality and tourism sectors has been extended to the end of September, and will only go up to 12.5% after that, before returning to 20% next April.

DUTY ON BEER, CIDER, SPIRITS AND FUEL

Planned increases in duties on beer, cider, spirits and wine as well as fuel will be cancelled.

STAMP DUTY AND MORTGAGES

The stamp duty holiday on properties worth up to £500,000 will be extended from the end of March until the end of June and after that there will still be no duty on homes worth up to £250,000 for another three months. After that the threshold returns to the usual level of £125,000 from October. The government will guarantee 95% mortgages to help those who can only afford a 5% deposit.