The Budget of His Majesty's Government is an annual
budget
A budget is a calculation play, usually but not always financial, for a defined period, often one year or a month. A budget may include anticipated sales volumes and revenues, resource quantities including time, costs and expenses, environmenta ...
set by
HM Treasury
His Majesty's Treasury (HM Treasury), occasionally referred to as the Exchequer, or more informally the Treasury, is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for developing and executing the government's public finance policy and ec ...
for the following financial year, with the
revenue
In accounting, revenue is the total amount of income generated by the sale of goods and services related to the primary operations of the business.
Commercial revenue may also be referred to as sales or as turnover. Some companies receive reven ...
s to be gathered by
HM Revenue and Customs
HM Revenue and Customs (His Majesty's Revenue and Customs, or HMRC) is a non-ministerial government department, non-ministerial Departments of the United Kingdom Government, department of the His Majesty's Government, UK Government responsible fo ...
and the
expenditure
An expense is an item requiring an outflow of money, or any form of fortune in general, to another person or group as payment for an item, service, or other category of costs. For a tenant, rent is an expense. For students or parents, tuition is a ...
s of the
public sector
The public sector, also called the state sector, is the part of the economy composed of both public services and public enterprises. Public sectors include the public goods and governmental services such as the military, law enforcement, infra ...
, in compliance with
government
A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state.
In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...
policy. The budget statement is one of two statements made by the
Chancellor of the Exchequer
The chancellor of the Exchequer, often abbreviated to chancellor, is a senior minister of the Crown within the Government of the United Kingdom, and head of His Majesty's Treasury. As one of the four Great Offices of State, the Chancellor is ...
in the
House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...
, with the
Spring Statement
The Spring Statement of the British Government, also known as the "mini-budget", is one of the two statements HM Treasury makes each year to Parliament upon publication of economic forecasts, the second taking place the previous year as the Autum ...
being made the following year.
Budgets are usually set once every year and are announced in the
House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...
by the
Chancellor of the Exchequer
The chancellor of the Exchequer, often abbreviated to chancellor, is a senior minister of the Crown within the Government of the United Kingdom, and head of His Majesty's Treasury. As one of the four Great Offices of State, the Chancellor is ...
. Since autumn 2017 the United Kingdom budget typically takes place in the
Autumn
Autumn, also known as fall in American English and Canadian English, is one of the four temperate seasons on Earth. Outside the tropics, autumn marks the transition from summer to winter, in September ( Northern Hemisphere) or March ( Sou ...
in order to allow major tax changes to occur annually, well before the start of the fiscal year.
The most recent budget was presented by
Rishi Sunak
Rishi Sunak (; born 12 May 1980) is a British politician who has served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party since October 2022. He previously held two Cabinet of ...
on 27 October 2021. Sunak’s successor,
Kwasi Kwarteng
Akwasi Addo Alfred Kwarteng (born 26 May 1975) is a British Conservative Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Spelthorne in northern Surrey since May 2010. He was Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industria ...
, delivered a
fiscal event in September 2022. His successor
Jeremy Hunt
Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt (born 1 November 1966) is a British politician who has served as Chancellor of the Exchequer since 14 October 2022. He previously served in the Cabinet as Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport ...
delivered another
fiscal event in November 2022. Although not an official budget statement, they were widely referred to by the media as a "mini-budget".
Budget process
The UK
fiscal year
A fiscal year (or financial year, or sometimes budget year) is used in government accounting, which varies between countries, and for budget purposes. It is also used for financial reporting by businesses and other organizations. Laws in many ...
ends on 5 April each year. The financial year ends on 31 March of each year. Thus, the UK budget for financial year 2021 would cover the period from 1 April 2021 to 31 March 2022 and is often referred to as 2021–22.
Historically, the budget was usually released in March, less than one month before the beginning of the new fiscal year.
Parliament
In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...
was not expected to take action on a budget for the fiscal year until the summer, several months ''after'' the start of the fiscal year. For that reason, Parliament typically passed a "Vote on Account" in early spring that provided continuity of funding into the new fiscal year, up until the point that the new budget was enacted. The spending authorized in the Vote on Account was normally 45% of the amounts already authorized in the current fiscal year, taking into account the Main Estimates and any revised or Supplementary Estimates already approved by Parliament. Legislative action on the proposed budget generally aligned with the executive's original budget request; failure to carry the budget would regarded as tantamount to a vote of No Confidence in the Government.
Since November 2017 the budget was moved to the Autumn, with a view to passing the Finance Act before the commencement of the Financial Year. Votes on Account should no longer be necessary.
Governmental departments submit their funding requests — called "Main Supply Estimates" – to
HM Treasury
His Majesty's Treasury (HM Treasury), occasionally referred to as the Exchequer, or more informally the Treasury, is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for developing and executing the government's public finance policy and ec ...
. The government then releases this data in a large consolidated document titled "Central Government Supply Estimates (Budget Year-Following Year): Main Supply Estimates"
The government reserves the right to submit "Supplementary Estimates" in the spring and winter of a given fiscal year to update its agencies' spending totals for the current financial year and report any governmental re-organizations. When an agency submits a Supplementary Estimate, it is customary to also submit an "Estimate Memorandum" to the agency's relevant oversight committee in Parliament describing and justifying the changes. This condenses two functions – reporting supplemental spending requests and agency re-organizations.
List of budgets
Differences between the UK and other main economies
Differences between the UK and United States:
# The period of fiscal year. The UK fiscal year ends on 5 April each year, while in the United States it begins on 1 October and ends on 30 September the following year.
# The person that the budget document begins with. In the UK, Budgets are usually set once every year and are announced in the House of Commons by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. But, in the United States, it often begins with the President's proposal to Congress recommending funding levels for the next fiscal year.
Differences between the UK and the European Union:
# The entity that proposes the budget. In the EU, the budget is proposed annually by the European Commission, and reviewed and negotiated by the Council of the European Union (which represents Member States' governments) and the European Parliament (which represents EU citizens).
# In the EU, the annual budget must remain within ceilings determined in advance by the Multiannual Financial Framework, laid down for a (five to) seven-year period.
See also
*
Countries of the United Kingdom by GVA per capita The countries of the United Kingdom by GVA per capita sets out the gross value added per capita for each of the countries of the United Kingdom as well as separate figures for the nine English regions.
2020
2019
2018
References
See a ...
*
United Kingdom national debt
The United Kingdom national debt is the total quantity of money borrowed by the Government of the United Kingdom at any time through the issue of securities by the British Treasury and other government agencies.
At the end of December 2021, UK ...
*
Budget Day
Budget Day is the day that a government presents its budget to a legislature for approval, in a ceremonial fashion. It only exists in some countries of the world.
India
The Union Budget of India, referred to as the Annual Financial Statement i ...
*
Economy of the United Kingdom
The economy of the United Kingdom is a highly developed social market and market-orientated economy. It is the sixth-largest national economy in the world measured by nominal gross domestic product (GDP), ninth-largest by purchasing power pa ...
*
Departments of the United Kingdom Government
The Government of the United Kingdom is divided up into departments. These, according to the government, are responsible for putting government policy into practice. There are currently 23 ministerial departments, 20 non-ministerial departments ...
*
Government spending in the United Kingdom
Central government spending in the United Kingdom, also called public expenditure, is the responsibility of the UK Government, the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government and the Northern Ireland Executive. In the budget for financial year ...
*
Whole of Government Accounts Whole of Government Accounts (WGA) is the annual publication by the United Kingdom Government of the consolidated financial statements of over 5,500 organisations across the public sector. It aims to provide more complete data for fiscal planning by ...
References
Further reading
* Browning, Peter. ''The Treasury and Economic Policy: 1964-1985'' (Longman, 1986).
* Dell, Edmund. ''The Chancellors: A History of the Chancellors of the Exchequer, 1945-90'' (HarperCollins, 1997) 619pp; 17 chapters covering the terms of each Chancellor.
* Fairclough, Isabela, and Norman Fairclough. "Practical reasoning in political discourse: The UK government’s response to the economic crisis in the 2008 Pre-Budget Report." ''Discourse & Society'' 22.3 (2011): 243-268
online* Walsh, Catherine. "Protesting Too Much: Alastair Darling's constructions after the Financial Crash." ''Critical Discourse Studies'' 13.1 (2016): 41-56.
* Woodward, Nicholas. ''The management of the British economy, 1945-2001'' (
Manchester University Press
Manchester University Press is the university press of the University of Manchester, England and a publisher of academic books and journals. Manchester University Press has developed into an international publisher. It maintains its links with th ...
, 2004).
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:United Kingdom Budget
Budget
A budget is a calculation play, usually but not always financial, for a defined period, often one year or a month. A budget may include anticipated sales volumes and revenues, resource quantities including time, costs and expenses, environmenta ...