Budget March 2020

Post by **adam2** » Wed Mar 11, 2020 2:16 pm

This thread is for discussions about the budget.
Please confine budget related remarks to this thread.

Post by **adam2** » Wed Mar 11, 2020 2:27 pm

My views are summarised as,

Freezing of duty on road fuel-----------------bad.
Massive road building -------------------------bad.
Freeze in alcohol duties------------------------good.
Freeze in tobacco duty-------------------------neutral.
Business rates holiday for small shops--------good.
Increased NI threshold-------------------------good

Various measures to reduce the impact of the coronavirus, generally good.

cubes · Post by **cubes** » Wed Mar 11, 2020 8:22 pm

Magic money tree: found!

fuzzy · Post by **fuzzy** » Wed Mar 11, 2020 9:24 pm

The NI threshold could mean various things. It could mean that you have to earn more before you get NI credits towards the state pension. Osborne used to play that trick.

Post by **clv101** » Wed Mar 11, 2020 10:00 pm

Economy predicted to grow by 1.1% this year, revised down from 1.4% a year ago. The figure, which does not take into account the impact of coronavirus, would be the slowest growth since 2009.

Fuel duty to be frozen for the 10th consecutive year

Madness. Year on year, we have been reducing fuel duty by 1-2% in real terms for a decade.

VAT on digital publications, including newspapers, e-books and academic journals to be scrapped from December

Probably a good thing, but disappointing that audiobooks are excluded.

Subsidies for fuel used in off-road vehicles - known as red diesel - will be scrapped "for most sectors" in two years' time. Red diesel subsidies will remain for farmers and rail operators.

Who does this mainly affect? Who are the big red diesel users outside farming and rail? Boats? Does this represent a huge tax hike on fishing? Forestry? Construction (diggers, bulldozers, etc?). Seems odd to freeze (cut) duty on regular road use, but hike it on lots of small sectors where there is very little alternative?

There will be Â£27bn for motorways and other arterial roads, including new tunnel for the A303 near Stonehenge

Madness. We need to be figuring out ways to drive less not more!

Post by **kenneal - lagger** » Thu Mar 12, 2020 2:22 pm

The problem is that economic advisors to the government and the economic system that they serve are still addicted to growth

careful_eugene · Post by **careful_eugene** » Thu Mar 12, 2020 3:32 pm

clv101 wrote:

Subsidies for fuel used in off-road vehicles - known as red diesel - will be scrapped "for most sectors" in two years' time. Red diesel subsidies will remain for farmers and rail operators.
Who does this mainly affect? Who are the big red diesel users outside farming and rail? Boats? Does this represent a huge tax hike on fishing? Forestry? Construction (diggers, bulldozers, etc?). Seems odd to freeze (cut) duty on regular road use, but hike it on lots of small sectors where there is very little alternative?

I'm guessing the biggest red diesel user outside of those 2 would be the construction industry.

Post by **adam2** » Thu Mar 12, 2020 5:25 pm

Yes, construction equipment, including generators and air compressors can use red diesel at present, but wont be allowed to in the future.
Also boats.
And presumably heating in non domestic premises.

vtsnowedin · Post by **vtsnowedin** » Thu Mar 12, 2020 8:45 pm

adam2 wrote:Yes, construction equipment, including generators and air compressors can use red diesel at present, but wont be allowed to in the future.
Also boats.
And presumably heating in non domestic premises.

The usual line here is that the excavators and cranes etc. can use untaxed off road diesel but the dump trucks cannot but often the construction zone limits are set out far enough so that trucks can cycle between job and quarry or asphalt plant while using dyed untaxed so that the contractor does not have to have two different fuel trucks come each day and top off all the tanks. As all bidders can take the same advantage from this it as looked at as lowering the bid price of the job and a wash in the long run.