Phone lines red hot

Let's start with rabbits out of hats, and it came in the form of stamp duty from Philip Hammond.

Interestingly this has crossover with the most high-profile tax yet to be devolved.

The Welsh version, called land transaction tax, takes effect in April.

It means there will be no stamp duty owed on properties up to £150,000 - a rise from £125,000.

The details were set out a few months ago with great fanfare that nine of the ten home buyers in Wales will either pay the same tax or less.

Immediate

And then Philip Hammond comes along and abolishes stamp duty for all first time buyers for properties worth up to £300,000, with immediate effect.

I am told the phone lines at estate agents have been red hot.

So a first time buyer looking to complete on a property worth £200,000 in Wales now will not pay stamp duty, but after April they will pay stamp duty of 2.5% on £50,000 - which works out at £1,250.

There are variations out there but the average property price for first time buyers in Wales is below £150,000 so most will not be out of pocket.

I have just spoken to the Finance Secretary Mark Drakeford and he was open-minded to changing parts of the new Welsh tax in light of the announcement by Philip Hammond.

First time buyers

The key point will be how many first time buyers break through that £150,000 mark, and if it is not that many, then he will be able to afford to do something to make sure that they do not lose out.

This is not the first time that a Chancellor has ended up stealing the thunder from Welsh Government plans on stamp duty.

George Osborne also removed the old slab structure to the tax, which led to dramatic rises once certain thresholds were hit, and was something ministers in Cardiff Bay had been eyeing up to change in a Welsh version.

Before I touch on the Welsh Government settlement, it is worth saying that like elsewhere in the UK, the changes on universal credit are hugely important for the thousands affected by the changes, and more broadly, the downgrading of growth forecasts for the UK economy are obviously of huge, and worrying significance.

The extra money for public services in Wales from the Chancellor, via the Welsh Government, has broken through the £1bn mark for the first time in recent years.

Treasury

It is over a four year period but the amount of cash is far higher than we are used to talking about, for example if you go back to the spring of 2015, the finance minister at the time Jane Hutt was talking about an extra £18m.

But here is the health warning: the Welsh Government says that two thirds of the extra cash is effectively a loan that has to be repaid to the Treasury, and there are strings attached to the way it is spent.

The Treasury come-back is that this form of funding is common-place throughout the UK (incidentally there have been similar complaints from the Scottish Government).

The money has to be used to generate economic activity so typically, the extra funds could be leant to housing associations across Wales to build more properties because it would create jobs and the associations would be in a position to pay the money back because they have an income stream.

When it comes to 'no-strings attached' revenue cash, the kind of sought-after money they can do what they want with, there is around £200m over four years.

To put these kind of telephone digit figures into context, a 1% pay rise across the board in the Welsh public sector would cost around £100m a year.

But from a UK Government perspective, the view will be that while there may be complaints about the type of funding on offer, there are at least discussions underway about money - in other words it is hardly crippling austerity, which has been the response of choice from the Welsh Government in recent years.