With little wriggle room, a host of pre-announced spending pledges and huge uncertainty over the UK’s departure from the European Union, expectations for high drama to emerge from Philip Hammond’s Autumn Budget were somewhat low.

However, the chancellor has unveiled a range of measures likely to be welcomed in the architecture and construction sector – including tax breaks for the construction of new commercial buildings and the immediate end to a local authority borrowing restriction on building new council homes.

Hammond also announced an additional £500m for the government’s Housing Infrastructure Fund, taking the overall cash pot, which aims to “to unlock 650,000 homes” to £5.5bn, and a £675m Future High Streets Fund to support a refocusing away from “under-used retail” towards housing and workspace.

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