Treasury enjoys bumper January tax haul

Chancellor Philip Hammond’s efforts to balance the books have been given a boost after the Treasury enjoyed a bumper haul of tax receipts last month, according to new figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

It found that public sector net borrowing, excluding state-owned banks, was in surplus of £10 billion in January, better than economists’ expectations for a surplus of £9.6bn.

The latest figure is the second-highest amount since records began in April 1993, but is £1.6bn lower than the figure logged in January 2017.

Government coffers were bolstered by receipts on selfassessed income tax and capital gains tax, which totalled £18.4bn in January, but marked a £900 million drop from a year earlier.

The deficit excluding banks for the current financial year – April 2017 to January 2018 – dropped by £7.2bn to £37.7bn.

It puts the government on track to beat full-year targets, with the Office for Budget Responsibility forecasting in November that public sector net borrowing would reach £49.9bn in the year to the end of March.

The news came as it also emerged that productivity growth reached a ten-year high. The ONS said output per hour rose 0.8 per cent in the three months to December, coming after growth of 0.9 per cent in the previous period, with the UK having experienced the strongest two quarters of productivity growth since the recession of 2008.

Wages also increased more than expected. Excluding bonuses, earnings rose by 2.5 per cent, year-on-year. 0 The government is in line to beat full-year targets