In the Budget 2025 on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, made several announcements of relevance to local government practitioners, including on local government finance, governance, healthcare, social care, children’s social care, education, licensing, planning, public procurement and pensions. Alan Murdie, Director at Council Tax Legal Services and Tim Coolican, partner and head of health and social care sector at Anthony Collins, have commented on the package of measures.

In the Budget 2025, on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, announced (i) a £2,000 annual cap (from April 2029) on salary sacrifice pension contributions eligible for NICs relief, (ii) a relaxation of defined benefit (DB) surplus rules from April 2027 to allow well-funded schemes to make incentivised surplus payments directly to members, and (iii) new CPI-linked inflation protection (capped at 2.5%) for pre-1997 PPF and FAS pensions where legacy schemes had provided such increases.

In the Autumn Budget 2025, delivered on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, confirmed the government’s commitment to ‘rebuild Britain’. The Budget reinforced the government’s ambitions on housing supply, planning reform, economic growth and regional regeneration. Chrisa Tsompani, partner at Davitt Jones Bould, and Fiona Sawyer, knowledge lawyer at Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer, comment on these measures.

In the Budget 2025, on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, set out a number of measures impacting the property industry, though not all of those that some commentators predicted. Chrisa Tsompani, Partner at Davitt Jones Bould, provides further commentary below on the Chancellor’s plan.

In the Autumn Budget 2025, on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, made several announcements of relevance to Public Law practitioners, including on cross-government efficiency and public sector reform, oversight of Covid-era procurement and fraud, devolution and new integrated settlements for mayoral authorities, justice and sentencing reform, planning and infrastructure delivery (including changes to judicial review), public procurement and the Balance Sheet Framework, and defence and security investment.

In the Autumn Budget 2025, delivered on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, announced or confirmed reforms and investment to: support AI in the UK following the AI Opportunities Action Plan, support research & development (R&D) in the UK, invest in NHS technology to improve productivity, remove barriers to gigabit-capable broadband and scale commercial drone operations.

In the Budget 2025, on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, announced a package of reforms with implications for policing, enforcement, economic crime, regulatory frameworks, sentencing, prisons and national security.

In the Budget 2025, on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP, announced a suite of fiscal and regulatory measures with direct implications for environmental law, environmental governance and the wider regulatory framework under the Environment Act 2021 and Climate Change Act 2008. Although the Budget is framed around economic growth, productivity and infrastructure delivery, a significant number of measures affect environmental taxation, carbon pricing, land remediation, waste and resource efficiency, and the planning regime governing major development.

In the Budget 2025, on 26 November 2025, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Rt Hon Rachel Reeves MP announced several measures that will be of interest to restructuring and insolvency professionals. The measures include changes to business rates, recruitment of additional Insolvency Service staff to tackle abusive phoenixism and rogue directors, establishment of the Public Authorities Fraud Investigation and Enforcement Service, and reforms to National Insurance Contributions.

Share Incentives analysis: Elissavet Grout is a partner in the Tax Department at Travers Smith LLP and heads the firm's Incentives and Remuneration group. Elissavet has extensive experience in advising on the design, implementation and tax treatment of remuneration arrangements for a wide range of UK and international clients. In this article, Elissavet considers the cap on National Insurance contributions (NICs) relief for pension contributions made as part of a salary sacrifice arrangement announced at Budget 2025. The Bill to give the Treasury the power to introduce the change with effect from April 2029 was introduced to Parliament on 4 December.

Ireland-Property analysis: This article was written by tax director, Mary Dineen of Arthur Cox LLP. This update outlines the legislative provisions implementing the residential-focused tax measures announced in Budget 2026, as set out in the Finance Bill 2025 (the Bill).

Law360: The Labour government's decision to cut £50m (US$64m) from its communication and marketing budget for the next two years could jeopardise the successful rollout of the long-delayed pensions portal program, provider Aegon has warned.