Rachel Reeves needs to find another £5.8bn, following the U-turn on the Universal Credit/Personal Independence Payment (£4.5bn) bill and the reinstatement of the Winter Fuel Allowance (£1.3bn). Where will she get this from?

Labour have absolutely tied themselves in a knot by pledging not to ‘increase tax on working people’, nor increasing VAT or Corporation Tax. My predictions for the Autumn Budget:

1. A further increase in dividend tax rates. Note that most director/shareholders – even of one man band companies – will take a small salary and the rest in dividends, so this would affect them badly. And it is hard to exclude them from the ‘working people’ definition.
2. Further freezing of tax thresholds. I am confident that this will be done, as it’s more politically palatable and not seen as a ‘tax rise’ by the public, although in practice it absolutely is.
3. Raising Fuel Duty, which has been frozen since 2011. Separately, with increases in electric cars (incentivised through the tax system) Reeves will at some point have to understand how Fuel Duty income will be replaced.
4. A reduction in higher or additional rate relief on pensions. At present, higher and additional rate taxpayers can get 40% or 45% relief respectively on their pension contributions. Reeves might change this to a maximum of (say) 30%.
5. Reducing the tax free draw down on pensions – to a cap of say £100,000, rather than 25% of the pension value.

Any tax rises will be hugely unpopular, particularly if they are linked (which opposition parties will no doubt do) to the increased funding bill for Universal Credit/PIP.