Spending review 2025

I think the 25 billion is from the rise in employer’s NIC announced in last year’s Autumn Statement.

Reeves doesn’t need to raise taxes more to pay for this. It can be done through borrowing. People need to get their heads around how public spending is financed, through the City and anybody else who wants to lend the Goverment money - e.g. Premium Bond holders who have lent the the government £130 billion with no guarantee of a return.

www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2024/04/29/tax-does-not-pay-for-government-spending/

I agree that social care is the big issue, one that is bankrupting local councils. The previous government’s care cap scheme was flawed and would have placed an additional burden on councils around year three in most cases when self-funders care costs would have reached the cap. Labour were right to ditch it (after the Tories had already postponed the implementation) but I am yet to see any proposals. Adult social care needs to be nationalised, no question, so that venture capitalists aren’t creaming off the top as they have been for years.

I would like to see a massive programme of social housebuilding funded by person investors. I would certainly buy government bonds issued for that purpose. If Reeves were to tweak the cash ISA system, to reduce the £20,000 limit, that’s what I would like to see encouraged - a move from personal cash savings to personal investment in public projects.

Affordable housing is not really affordable. We need social housing.

That question's for me too Sarnia, a spending review especially where there are going to be big increases in some areas, automatically raises the question of where the money will come from.

Unless we know, we can't be certain that what will be announced today will actually happen.

Looking at the NHS for me the big question is - what is going to happen to social care?

If the who caboodle is to operate as it should' then social care needs massive re-organisation and funding.

Thanks. I agree with the priorities on the whole but I’d have liked to see more earmarked for education.

And I fear that nothing will touch the sides of the NHS in 5 or even 10 years, esp unless social care is tackled in tandem.
Btw I thought NHS England was being abolished?

Affordable housing, yes.

Defence, yes now that the paucity of our contribution to NATO has been exposed, but I wouldn’t like to see this funded by increased arms trading.

We don’t pay enough tax in this country to fund the services we need. I’d like to see the govt get serious about this soon.

You will have to wait for the budget in the autumn.

This thread is about the spending review.

But I think that we can agree that few recent chancellors have had such a difficult headwind as this chancellor, given Trump’s proclivities and the threat from Putin etc.

The question for me is, where is she getting this money?
Reeves has to raise taxes, surely, which will not be a popular move.
Having worked for the NHS I wish they would do a thorough overhaul from top to bottom because eyewatering amounts of money are wasted. Millions could be saved instead of increasing the budget every year.