The Chancellor decided against attacking pension tax reliefs – leaving the annual allowance unchanged and actually increasing the lifetime allowance next tax year from £1 million to £1.03 million in line with inflation.

As usual the government has introduced several provisions to counter both tax avoidance and evasion. Personal service companies – IR35 – are again in the Chancellor’s sights, with a strong possibility that the tax rules recently applied to the public sector will be extended into the private sector.

Company cars have received some attention. There has been the normal uplift to charges for the coming tax year; and in addition drivers of cars with diesel engines will generally have to pay even more.