The Chancellor, Rachel Reeves MP, delivered the Government’s Spring Statement on 26 March 2025. Proposals and reforms include:

• Introducing a series of decisive reforms to the planning system to support house building and economic growth. 
• Taking steps to close the tax gap
  • Prosecute more tax fraudsters by expanding its counter-fraud
  • Reform rewards for informants
  • Tackle “phoenixism” in a joint plan between HMRC, Companies House, and the Insolvency Service to tackle those using contrived insolvencies to evade tax and write off debts owed to others. This includes increasing the use of upfront payment demands, making more directors personally liable for company taxes, and increasing the number of enforcement 
  • More HMRC staff – additional 600 HMRC staff to be recruited, and £100 million invested over the next five years for 500 additional compliance staff. 
  • Expand the rollout of Make Tax Digital for income tax Self Assessment to sole traders and landlords with incomes over £20,000 from April 2028. 
  • Increasing late payment penalties from April 2025 onwards. The new rates will be 3% of the tax outstanding where tax is overdue by 15 days, plus 3% where tax is overdue by 30 days, plus 10% per annum where tax is overdue by 31 days or more. 
  • HMRC will restart “direct recovery” of tax debts owed by individuals and companies who have the ability to pay but choose not to do so. 
  • The government will also explore options to automate the process for collecting lower value tax debts. 
  • Consultation on modernising how HMRC acquires and uses third-party data to make it easier for taxpayers to get tax right first time.
  • Consultation on options to simplify and strengthen HMRC’s inaccuracy and failure to notify penalties. 
  • Consultation on options to enhance HMRC’s powers and sanctions to take swifter and stronger action against tax advisers who facilitate non-compliance.
  • Consultation on a package of measures to close in on promoters of marketed tax avoidance.
• The Planning and Infrastructure Bill to streamline planning processes and unlock a new scale of housing and critical infrastructure delivery
• Bringing forward a £625 million package of skills measures to address large-scale skills shortages in the construction sector, needed to deliver the government’s plans to build 1.5 million homes in England
• Creating a £3.25 billion Transformation Fund to support the fundamental reform of public

services, seize the opportunities of digital technology and Artificial Intelligence (AI),

and transform frontline delivery to release savings for taxpayers over the long-term.

• £8 million for new technology for probation officers.
• • £25 million for the fostering system, including funding the recruitment of a

further 400 new fostering households.

• £42 million for three pioneering Frontier AI Exemplars.
• £150 million for government employee exit schemes

• From 1 October 2026, new residential developments in England (with certain exemptions) will incur the Building Safety Levy to raise revenue to be spent on building safety.
• From summer 2025, employed individuals liable to the HICBC will be able to report their family’s Child Benefit payments through a new digital service and opt to pay HICBC directly through PAYE, without the need to register for Self Assessment.
• A consultation on widening the use of advance clearances in R&D tax credits to help reduce error and fraud, provide certainty to businesses, and improve the customer experience.
• A consultation on proposals for a new process to provide increased tax certainty in

advance for major projects.

• Reviewed the transfer pricing treatment of Cost Contribution Arrangements as set out in the Corporate Tax Roadmap and has set out how businesses can obtain improved

certainty on the transfer pricing treatment of such arrangements through the UK’s existing Advance Pricing Agreement programme.

• Temporarily exempting numerous goods from tariff duty to avoid unnecessary costs for UK businesses. This measure will suspend tariffs on goods including plywood and a range of food items until June 2027.
• Private Intermittent Securities and Capital Exchange System (PISCES) 
  • publishing, for technical consultation, a draft statutory instrument providing an exemption from Stamp Duty and Stamp Duty Reserve Tax for PISCES share transactions. A power to make the regulations was introduced in the Finance Act 2025.
  • A technical note, which provides guidance on the tax implications for companies and employees where a company has shares traded on PISCES.
• Climate Change Levy (CCL) Consultation and conduct a wider CCL review.