2022 Autumn Statement

On 17 November 2022, Chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt, delivered the autumn statement. Here the key announcements for payroll professionals to be aware of:

Tax
• from April 2023, the threshold at which people pay the additional rate of income tax (charged at 45%) will be lowered from £150,000 to £125,140
• the government will maintain the current freeze on income tax personal allowance and higher-rate tax thresholds until April 2028 (this was originally due to be in place until April 2026, meaning an extension of two years).

National Insurance (NI)
• the primary threshold, secondary threshold, upper earnings limit, upper secondary threshold, apprentices upper secondary threshold, veteran upper secondary threshold and freeports upper secondary threshold all frozen until April 2028
• the employment allowance will remain at £5,000.

National minimum wage (NMW) / national living wage (NLW)
• the government is accepting the recommendations of the Low Pay Commission, in terms of increased to the NMW and NLW. The table below shows the new rates for use from pay reference periods beginning on or after 1 April 2023, along with the associated percentage increases.

Rate from April 2023 Current rate (April 2022 to March 2023) Increase
National Living Wage £10.42 £9.50 9.7%
21-22 Year Old Rate £10.18 £9.18 10.9%
18-20 Year Old Rate £7.49 £6.83 9.7%
16-17 Year Old Rate £5.28 £4.81 9.7%
Apprentice Rate £5.28 £4.81 9.7%
Accommodation Offset £9.10 £8.70 4.6%

Pensions
• the triple lock will be honoured in 2023, meaning the state pension will increase in line with inflation, by 10.1%.

HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC)
• a further £79 million will be invested over the course of the next five years to allow HMRC to allocate more staff to tackling cases of serious tax fraud and address tax compliance risks among the wealthy.

The CIPP’s full autumn statement document can be found here: CIPP’s Autumn Statement 2022 summary | CIPP.