00:00 Well, it's the Chancellor's autumn statement on Wednesday.
00:03 And what do we know about it?
00:05 The Prime Minister has already confirmed that there will be tax cuts.
00:09 And in his words, these will be targeted and very much aimed at boosting investment and innovation.
00:17 Britain's economy is stalled at the moment.
00:20 There was zero growth in the most recent quarter.
00:23 The problem here is that the Chancellor and the Prime Minister have got a
00:28 very delicate balancing act to pull off.
00:31 They've been stressing for months and months that they need to get inflation down.
00:37 That inflation was the number one priority.
00:39 Now they want to get the economy growing as well.
00:44 But the problem is that if you do too many tax cuts, then you risk putting up inflation.
00:50 A number of measures which we're also expecting in the autumn statement,
00:56 for example, some quite significant welfare changes.
01:00 So the government is very keen to get more people back into the workforce.
01:05 And some of this will be done by offering more support.
01:09 On the other hand, there will also be a tougher sanctions regime.
01:13 There are also two other difficult decisions facing the Chancellor.
01:17 One on the state pension and the other on benefits.
01:21 Jeremy Hunt could increase pensions in line with total earnings
01:26 under what is called the triple lock system.
01:28 So that would mean an increase of around 8.5%,
01:32 but would be quite costly for the Treasury.
01:35 Mr Hunt could decide to increase benefits in line with September inflation.
01:42 Or he could go for the more recent figure, which is the October inflation number of 4.6%.
01:49 But again, in the middle of a cost of living crisis, that would again prove controversial.
01:54 The big picture in this autumn statement is that having spent months and months and months
02:00 stressing how important it is to get down inflation,
02:03 now they're switching the focus onto trying to get economic growth.
02:07 They hope that this will happen in months.
02:09 There should be a slightly better feel good fact in the country,
02:12 just in time for a general election.
02:15 [MUSIC PLAYING]
02:19 (gentle music)
