Autumn Budget 2024: The key points

The chancellor raised taxes by £40bn, announcing a stamp duty hike for second homes, as well as an increase in employers’ national insurance contributions in a bid to “fix the foundations” of the economy and “deliver change” by protecting working people.

The key points of the Budget include:

• increasing stamp duty on second homes from 3% to 5% from tomorrow (31st October), a move the chancellor said would support 130,000 additional transactions from first-time buyers 
• increasing employers’ NI contributions from 13.8% to 15% from April 2025
• decreasing thresholds at which employers start paying NI contributions on each employee’s salary from £9,100 per year to £5,000
• raising capital gains tax at the higher rate from 20% to 24% and 10% to 18% at the lower rate
• gradually increasing business asset disposal relief to 14% in April 2025 and to 18% from 2026/27
• increasing the national living wage to £12.21 per hour from April 2025, representing an increase of £1,400 to the annual earnings of a full-time worker on national living wage 
• investing £5bn to deliver 1.5 million new homes
• adding £500m to the Affordable Homes Programme
• providing an additional £3bn of support for SMEs and the BTR sector through housing guarantee schemes