Current year tax receipts

Budget 2009 predicted that tax receipts this year would drop by 8% - but they've actually dropped by 12.9%. October is quite an important month for tax collections, since VAT and corporation tax receipts tend to be much greater in the months of January, April, July and October. January is the peak month for tax collections, since that's the month for final income tax payments, as well.

Corporation tax is always the hardest tax to predict. In normal years, Corporation tax accounts for about 8% of total tax revenue. The Chancellor predicted that receipts this year wold be 20% lower than last year; in fact, they've dropped by 30% to date.