Commit a further £13 million to Hull UK City of Culture 2017, which includes £5 million towards the refurbishment of Hull New Theatre and £8 million to ensure a lasting cultural legacy in Hull.

Subject to business case approval and planning permission being granted, establish a new theatre in Knowsley.

The government has announced, following the introduction of the welfare cap in 2014, that it intends for the cap to be met by the end of the Parliament when the Office for Budget Responsibility conducts its next assessment at Autumn Statement 2016.

Support will be provided to self-employed individuals who are on working tax credit and universal credit. The government will give this group access to business support and extend the existing mentoring support offered by the New Enterprise Allowance scheme. Alongside this, a trial of face-to-face support will be offered by Jobcentre Advisors for self-employed working tax credit claimants, with the intention of rolling this out more widely if it is successful.

As previously announced, the government will fund an additional £15 million each year from 2017-18 to help Employment and Support Allowance claimants in the work related activity group and universal credit limited capability for work claimants pay for the costs associated with preparing for work. It will also improve the process for reassessing claimants placed in the work related activity group with deteriorating conditions and remove the 52 week work time limit on permitted work rules for claimants in the work related activity group from April 2017.

The government has accepted the recommendations of a taskforce on how to provide £330 million of additional funding for disabled claimants by providing a new peer support offer to disabled people, and bespoke employment support for certain groups.

From autumn 2016, the government will introduce exemptions to the benefit cap for recipients of guardian's allowance, carer’s allowance and the carers element of universal credit. The cap currently caps the amount of benefits out-of-work working-age families can receive at £20,000, and at £23,000 in Greater London.

The government has stated that the date that new or renewed tenancies in the social sector will be subject to the cap on housing benefit at the relevant local housing allowance rate will be deferred for supported accommodation from April 2016 to April 2017. The reason for this is to enable a review of supported accommodation to be undertaken.

The government will delay the ending of the payments of housing benefit and pension credit to claimants who travel outside of Great Britain for longer than four consecutive weeks until May 2016.

In relation to disability benefits, the government has announced that it will be changing the way that entitlement to personal independence payment is determined by reducing the number of assessment points awarded for needing to use an aid or appliance to carry out two of the "daily living" activities assessed. It will also alter the arrangements for terminally ill claimants migrating from disability living allowance to personal independence payment.

The government will increase the number of employment support allowance and personal independence payment presenting officers attending tribunal hearings from 2017, to support the tribunal in making the right decision.

More generally, the government will be considering whether there is a case for long-term reform of disability benefits and services.

The use of HMRC's Real Time Information (RTI) on earnings to prevent and correct overpayments in jobseeker’s allowance, employment support allowance and income support will be extended to prevent benefit fraud and errors.

The government has announced that it will cut business rates for all properties in England, with 600,000 small firms paying no rates, so that the business rates burden will fall by £6.7 billion over the next five years.

The government also intends to permanently double Small Business Rate Relief (SBRR) from 50% to 100% and increase the thresholds to benefit a greater number of businesses. Those businesses with a property with a rateable value of £12,000 and below will receive 100% relief.

From April 2020, taxes for all businesses paying rates will be cut through a change in their indexation from RPI to CPI.

The government has proposed to modernise the administration of business rates to revalue properties more frequently (at least every three years) and make it easier for businesses to pay the taxes that are due. A discussion paper will be published in March 2016 outlining how this can be achieved alongside ensuring the continued stability of local authority funding.

Business rates collection and billing will be modernised and, by 2022, local authority business rate systems will be linked to HMRC digital tax accounts. This will require work with local authorities to standardise business rate bills and ensure that ratepayers have the option to receive and pay bills online by April 2017. Once this has been achieved, the government intends to consider whether it is possible to replace small business rates relief with a business rates allowance for small businesses applicable to their entire property portfolio across multiple local authority areas. The government has stated that local authorities will be compensated for the loss of income as a result of these changes, and the impact considered as part of the government’s consultation on the implementation of 100% business rate retention in summer 2016.

In relation to business rates in London, the government states that it will increase the share of London's business rates retained by the Greater London Authority and transfer responsibility for funding Transport for London’s capital projects, giving the Mayor of London control over almost £1 billion more of locally raised taxes. Alongside these changes, the government will also explore moving to 100% business rates retention by the Greater London Authority (and Liverpool City Region and Greater Manchester). This offer is also available to other city regions that have ratified their devolution deals ahead of the full roll-out of the business rates reforms.

The government will allow local authorities in England to use their discretionary relief powers to support publicly owned public lavatories from 1 April 2018.

The government will introduce a £1,500 business rates discount for office space occupied by local newspapers in England, subject to certain limits, for two years from 1 April 2017.

A summary of the responses received as part of the long-term review of business rates in England will be published in March 2016.

New devolution deals have been agreed with the West of England, East Anglia, and Greater Lincolnshire. These will give these local areas new powers over transport, planning, skills, a £900 million investment fund over 30 years to grow the local economy and access to £175 million ringfenced funding to deliver new homes.

Under the existing devolution deals with Manchester, Liverpool City Region, Sheffield City Region, the North East and Tees Valley, 57% of the population of the North of England will be covered by an elected mayor. For more information on the Cities and Local Government Devolution Act 2016, see Legal update, Cities and Local Government Devolution Bill has its first reading.

It has agreed a further devolution deal with Greater Manchester, including a commitment to work towards the devolution of criminal justice powers as well as supporting the establishment of a Life Chances Investment Fund. The government anticipates that devolving justice responsibilities will enable Greater Manchester to offer seamless interventions as individuals transition between prisons and the community and to join up public services to tackle the causes of crime and to prevent re-offending.

A second devolution deal with Liverpool City Council has been agreed. This builds upon the mayoral deal of 17 November 2015 and gives Liverpool additional new powers over transport. It also pilots the approach to 100% business rate retention across the city and commits the city region and government to work together on children's services, health, housing and justice.

The mayoral devolution deals that have previously been agreed will also each receive un-ringfenced single pots of funding to spend on local priorities, worth £2.86 billion in total. The government's intention is that this flexibility will allow areas to take more control over strategic investment. The single pots will initially include a five-year settlement rolling together existing transport funding, gainshare investment funds and Local Growth Fund allocations. In the future, this will be supplemented with further flexibility over central government funding.

It will establish a new Broadband Investment Fund, in partnership with private sector investors, to support the growth of alternative broadband networks by providing greater access to finance.

Deliver a 5G strategy in 2017, following an assessment by the National Infrastructure Commission on this.

Provide up to £5 million to develop options for an authoritative address register that is open and freely available.

It will announce a new government commitment that 750MHz of public sector spectrum in bands under 10GHz will be made available by 2022, of which 500MHz will be made available by 2020.

Distribute £14.5 million in grants to extend ultrafast broadband coverage in the South West.

Support the development of a network planning tool, to be trialed in Bournemouth.

Develop the next digital standard for the construction sector (Building Information Modelling).

Devolve power to school leaders and expects all schools to become Academies by 2020 or to have an Academy order in place to convert by 2022.

Accelerate the move to fairer funding for schools by replacing the existing system for funding with a national funding formula for schools from 2017-18. Subject to consultation, see Legal update, DfE publishes consultation on proposals to introduce a national funding formula for schools, the government's aim is for 90% of schools that gain additional funding to receive the full amount that they are due by 2020. In order to achieve this, the government proposes providing approximately £500 million of additional core funding to schools over the course of this spending review, on top of its commitment to maintain per pupil funding in cash terms. The government will retain a minimum funding guarantee.

Ask Professor Sir Adrian Smith to review the case for how to improve the study of mathematics from 16-18 years to ensure that the future workforce is skilled and competitive. The review, which will report in 2016, will include looking at the feasibility for more, or all, students continuing to study mathematics to 18 years.

Invest £20 million a year of new funding in a Northern Powerhouse schools strategy, in order to tackle educational divides between some parts of Northern England and the rest of the country. The government proposes bringing in support from the best leaders and schools in the North in order to enable coasting and vulnerable schools to improve. It will also ask Sir Nick Weller to lead an in-depth report into transforming education across the Northern Powerhouse.

The government has stated that it will abolish the Carbon Reduction Commitment energy efficiency scheme and replace it with an increase in the Climate Change Levy from 2019 (see CRC Survival Kit.) This will take effect from the end of the 2018-19 compliance year and businesses will be required to surrender allowances for the last time in October 2019.

The existing Climate Change Agreement scheme eligibility criteria will remain in place until at least 2023 (see Practice note, Climate change levy (CCL), climate change agreements (CCAs) and carbon price floor (CPF)).

The government will increase investment in flood defence and resilience by increasing the standard rate of insurance premium tax from 9.5% to 10% on insurers. Investment will be increased by more than £700 million by 2020-21, funded by a 0.5% increase in the standard rate of insurance premium tax. This includes £150 million to be invested in flood defence schemes in Leeds, Cumbria, Calder Valley and York and up to £25 million in flood defences in Carlisle (once the Environment Agency has concluded a review of its needs).

The government will increase funding to fund HMRC compliance activity to tackle tax evasion and non-compliance across the waste supply chain.

The government will publish a small modular nuclear reactor delivery roadmap later in 2016 and will allocate at least £30 million for research and development rogramme to develop nuclear skills capacity.

A consultation will be published later in 2016 on the priorities and delivery models for the Shale Wealth Fund, and how it can be deployed in local communities and the North as a whole.

HMRC will be publishing a consultation clarifying the scope of landfill tax later this year including the definition of a "taxable landfill disposal". The intention is that this definition will be changed in the Finance Bill 2017.

The government will legislate later in 2016 to reduce statutory plastic packaging recycling targets for 2016 and 2017 and set new recycling targets for glass and plastic packaging for 2018 to 2020.

The government will auction up to £730 million support for offshore wind and other less established renewable technologies during this parliament for projects generating electricity in 2021 to 2026.

£1.1 million to Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and £700,000 to Sheffield Children's Hospital Charity from banking fines. The funding will contribute to a helicopter landing pad in central Manchester and a fully digitally intra-operative 3T MRI scanner in Sheffield.

£2 million raised from banking fines to University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust. This commitment of matched funding will facilitate the building of a dedicated Paediatric Emergency and Trauma Department, bringing units which treat sick children into one location.

In order to deliver the government’s commitment to delivering 400,000 affordable housing starts by 2020-21, the government has:

The government will also be publishing a call for evidence on how the house-buying process can be made more consumer-friendly and deliver better value for money in order to avoid spend on failed housing transactions.

In order to reduce homelessness and rough sleeping, the government has stated that it will:

The government has announced that it will provide £19 million funding from Stamp Duty receipts for community-led housing schemes in areas most impacted by holiday homes in the South-West. Overall, £60 million will be provided to enable community-led housing developments in rural and coastal communities where the impact of second homes is particularly acute.

The government will accelerate the preparation and adoption of Local Plans.

The Private Rented Sector (PRS) Guarantee will be extended until December 2017 to encourage long term institutional investment in the private rented sector.

The government will explore options for encouraging private investment in low-cost homeownership, including the scope to use guarantees. It will also look at ways to extend homeownership to social tenants who cannot afford to take advantage of existing schemes.

The government has stated that it will work with local authorities on a local government land ambition, in order to release land with capacity for at least 160,000 homes, helping to support the government’s policy of regenerating council housing estates.

The government has confirmed that it will introduce a taper in relation to the "pay to stay" scheme (see Legal update, DCLG publishes consultation response to its "pay to stay" consultation). The policy will also be implemented on a voluntary basis by housing associations.

Up to £1.8 billion through a further round of Growth Deals with LEPs later this year. Further detail on the process for the next round of Growth Deals are to be announced.

A further £2 billion of the LGF through the Home Building Fund, a programme that provides finance to developers to unlock large housing sites and bring forward the necessary infrastructure required for large house building projects.

The government intends to further streamline and simplify the planning system by:

The Homes and Communities Agency will work with Network Rail and local authorities to provide land around stations for housing, commercial development and regeneration.

The government will make it easier for local authorities to work together to create new garden towns, as well as consult on a second wave of Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) reforms with the objective of making the CPO process clearer, fairer and quicker (see Legal update, 2015 Autumn Statement and Spending Review: key public sector announcements: Planning and public sector land). In smaller areas that want to establish garden villages and market towns of around 1,500 to 10,000 homes, the government will also provide technical and financial support. Alongside the government's announcement, the DCLG has also published a prospectus inviting expressions of interest from local authorities who want to create new communities based on garden city principles (see DCLG: Locally-led garden villages, towns and cities (16 March 2016)). The prospectus is divided into two parts depending on how many homes are involved. Where an expression of interest relates to a garden village of between 1,500 to 10,000 homes then these are invited by 31 July 2016 and where an expression of interest relates to new garden towns and cities of more than 10,000 homes then these will be accepted on a rolling basis. The prospectus also details the support that the government proposes to offer in each case.

The government will reform Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) on non-residential property transactions. The 2016 Budget announces that these rates will be reformed to a slice system, so that SDLT is payable on the portion of the transaction value which falls within each tax band. This change will take effect on 17 March 2016 (although transitional rules will exist for those who have exchanged contracts but not completed when the changes come into force).

The government has stated that the public sector can drive competition via open procurement practices. It will consult on new rules requiring local authorities to be transparent about the cost of the inhouse services they provide, and whether there could be savings from using competitive external providers.

The government will allow HMRC to collect additional data from businesses on certain tax reliefs and allowances. This will help the UK improve the monitoring of tax state aids and compliance with state aid guidelines. The government has also published a business tax policy paper on state aid modernisation covering a measure which provides HMRC with additional powers to collect information on certain state aids and share this information with the European Commission through a legal gateway (see HMRC: State aid modernisation (16 March 2016)).

The government has announced that it will conduct a departmental efficiency review, in order to deliver a further £3.5 billion of savings from public spending in 2019-20. The Chief Secretary to the Treasury, with the support of the Paymaster General, will lead this efficiency review, which will report in 2018.

The government has stated that it will build on the measures set out at Spending Review 2015 to deliver a surplus and ensure the sustainability of the public finances, it will do this by finding a further £3.5 billion of savings from public spending in 2019-20.

The government as part of its commitment to stronger and more focused economic regulators will work with economic regulators to review the business case for co-locating and sharing back office functions across regulators, reporting on this by Summer 2016.

Transport for London has been invited to propose ways of financing infrastructure projects from land value increases, which could support "flyunder" tunnels schemes to replace busy main roads.

The government is also supporting Transport for London to generate revenue from its property assets. This includes by consulting on reforms to compulsory purchase orders.

The government will provide £5 million to establish a fund to support smaller local infrastructure projects in outer London boroughs.