HMRC tells millions of workers to expect big change in April wage slip

Roughly 27 million worker in the UK will see a significant change to their April payslips this week. Many workers will see their national insurance contributions go down as the government's cuts take effect.

Overall, NICs have been cut by a third for British employees since Autumn 2023.

The main rate of employee NI has been cut from 12 per cent to 8 per cent, saving the average employee on £35,400 over £900 a year, according to the government.

Read more: DWP list of changes you need to declare or risk getting benefits cut

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said: “At the start of last year I made to pledge to half inflation. And because of the difficult decisions we have taken, inflation has more than halved and we are now able to reward work, and cut taxes for millions of workers who are seeing the benefit in their pay checks today.

“We have now cut National Insurance by £900 because it’s unfair that workers pay double tax on their income. We need to make it much simpler and much fairer and we are going to continue cutting this tax until it’s gone – while continuing to protect pensioners with the triple lock and providing record levels of funding to the NHS."

It comes after the government brought in a boost to the National Living Wage, driving it from £10.42 an hour to £11.44 an hour. The government claimed that the cuts to National Insurance and other economic changes brought in at the start of the month could save the average household up to £3,850.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt said: “We’re on the right track – we’ve been able to slash National Insurance to return hundreds of pounds back into the pockets of hard-working Brits because of the decisions we’ve made to manage the economy responsibly.

“Over the years ahead we want to get rid of National Insurance completely for workers – it is an unfair double tax on work and we’ve shown we can protect spending on public services while eliminating it.”