Pre-Budget report 2006 - Economy
Resources
Outcome brighter than the billing
When it comes to forecasting the economy, Gordon Brown’s brooding exterior masks a sunny optimism. Time and again, he has offered a bright outlook only to come out with downgrades and forecasts of better times.
Pharmaceutical companies set to benefit
Drug groups could earn extra revenues under government-endorsed plans to strengthen collaboration with regulators in order to bring new medicines more quickly to market
Osborne launches Brown broadside
The economic battlelines on which the Tories will seek to fight Gordon Brown at the general election clearly emerged as they attacked both his track record and his environmental credentials
Planning permission tax delayed
Treasury says proposed tax on profits from planning permission will be delayed by at least a year for further consultation and could even be scrapped entirely
Outlook darker than Brown’s rosy rhetoric
Gordon Brown’s carefully selected statistics do not tell the whole story about the UK economy, and Britain still lags behind the US and many European countries in terms of productivity growth.
Modest package of green tax rises
Motorists and air travellers bore the brunt of a modest package of green tax rises as Gordon Brown countered a Conservative push on the environment with action against polluters
Billions earmarked for education
The commitment to schools only serves to underline just how tough the next spending round is going to be
Tougher penalties for rogue employers
Tougher measures to deal with rogue employers who illegally pay workers less than the minimum wage are to be introduced.
Council funding report delayed again
The much-delayed report by Sir Michael Lyons into the funding of local government has been further delayed, and is now expected to be published by the time of the March Budget.
Motoring groups slam rise in fuel duty
Groups representing motorists and hauliers attacked the decision to use Wednesday’s pre-Budget report to impose the first fuel-duty increase since October 2003.
