{"id":111156,"date":"2026-08-26T03:58:41","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T03:58:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/111156\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T03:58:41","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T03:58:41","slug":"uk-tax-rises-back-on-the-table-as-burnham-faces-fiscal-crunch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/111156\/","title":{"rendered":"UK Tax Rises Back on the Table as Burnham Faces Fiscal Crunch"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBy City A.M <\/a> – Aug 25, 2026, 2:00 PM CDT<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
\nBurnham acknowledged that Britain\u2019s strained public finances could force difficult tax and spending decisions in the Autumn Budget.
\nJuly public-sector borrowing came in at \u00a31.8bn, adding to pressure on Chancellor John Healey as he prepares his first Budget.
\nCapital Economics says additional borrowing capacity is limited and estimates markets might tolerate roughly \u00a315bn under the right conditions. <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Downtown<\/p>\n

Andy Burnham has suggested tax rises could be on the cards in the looming Autumn Budget<\/a>, warning he \u201cwon\u2019t be unrealistic\u201d over the state of the public purse.<\/p>\n

The Prime Minister<\/a> quickly pledged to give people \u201cbreathing space\u201d and ease the cost of living after taking the keys to No.10 last month.<\/p>\n

But in fresh comments during his visit to Ukraine, Burnham acknowledged the fiscal pressures facing the UK and said his spending packages would be fully funded.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When pressed on whether he would need to raise taxes to cover spending gaps, he said: \u201cI won\u2019t be unrealistic, and people really need to understand that.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are in a challenging position; whatever I do will be carefully thought through, it will be funded, and there will be no more to come as we go into the Autumn.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burnham and Healey\u2019s limited room to manoeuvre<\/p>\n

Top economists have already warned that Chancellor John Healey will have little capacity<\/a> to announce fresh spending pledges after a spike in borrowing costs and the energy price shock triggered by the US-Iran war.<\/p>\n

Burnham, however, has insisted he would \u201ctry to help\u201d Brits in \u201cwhatever way\u201d possible, adding that he wouldn\u2019t \u201ctake risks\u201d with people\u2019s jobs or household finances.<\/p>\n

\u201cI will always take a careful approach to things. I ran Greater Manchester for 10 years and we ran a very tight ship with rock solid finances,\u201d Burnham said.<\/p>\n

Last week, official figures revealed Healey had overseen a surprise deficit in his first month as Chancellor. Government borrowing was recorded at \u00a31.8bn in July, which overshot market expectations. Analysts had predicted there would be no difference between expenditure and receipts in July.<\/p>\n

Analysis from Capital Economics has suggested that there would be \u201clittle scope\u201d to raise borrowing in the Budget later this year. A maximum of about \u00a315bn could be accepted, according to the consultancy, though tax rises are likely.<\/p>\n

A separate note by senior economist Ashley Webb warned that the UK was on track to post a deficit of above four per cent of GDP for the seventh year in a row.<\/p>\n

By City AM<\/a><\/p>\n

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Back to homepage<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By City A.M – Aug 25, 2026, 2:00 PM CDT Burnham acknowledged that Britain\u2019s strained public finances…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":111157,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[7786,45818,45819,1506,35390,12745,16162,4960,4501,5,431,6],"class_list":["post-111156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-uk","tag-andy-burnham","tag-autumn-budget","tag-capital-economics","tag-cost-of-living","tag-fiscal-policy","tag-gilt-yields","tag-government-borrowing","tag-john-healey","tag-tax-rises","tag-uk","tag-uk-economy","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/117159808401207474","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111156\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}