British finance chief unveils Budget 2025

LONDON -- British Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves unveiled the 2025 Budget on Wednesday, pledging that the government will neither return the country to austerity nor allow public spending and borrowing to spiral, while vowing to ease pressures on the cost of living.

According to a statement published on the British government's website, Reeves set out a wide range of proposals on public spending and taxation aimed at reducing borrowing and debt, safeguarding essential public services, stimulating economic growth, improving tax fairness, and advancing welfare reforms.

The Chancellor said she was determined to "break Britain out of its cycle of decline through stability, investment and reform," the statement noted.

Reeves highlighted a series of measures focused on addressing public priorities. These include cutting NHS waiting times, reducing energy bills and freezing rail fares, combating child poverty, increasing youth employment and the minimum wage, supporting retail and hospitality businesses as well as entrepreneurs and fast-growing companies, and accelerating homebuilding and infrastructure improvements.

A number of tax-related measures were also announced. These include freezing current personal tax thresholds from 2028 to 2031 to increase individual contributions, introducing a high-value council tax surcharge on expensive properties, imposing a new per-mile levy on electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles, raising online gambling duties, and extending the temporary reduction in fuel duty.