Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of freezing the personal tax allowance on low income households.

The Government is committed to keeping taxes for working people as low as possible while ensuring fiscal responsibility. At our first Budget, we decided not to extend the freeze on personal tax thresholds which was implemented by the previous Government.

The Government also remains committed to supporting low-income households in other ways, including through the Plan to Make Work Pay, the increase in the National Living Wage to £12.21 per hour from this April, and the new Fair Repayment Rate which caps debt repayments made through Universal Credit.