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It has recently been announced that the sale of 4G licences to telecoms operators has failed to raise the expected £3.5 Billion, coming in at £2.3 Billion so a shortfall of £1.2 Billion. This will be disappointing to the Chancellor, as he may have been quietly hoping for a bit of a windfall - licence auctions have done very nicely for the government in previous years. Since the cost of buying the licence is of course passed on to consumers through their mobile 'phone bills, the rest of us should perhaps be relieved, that what is effectively another tax may not now bite so deep. Although I am not naive enough to expect my phone bills to fall.

But turning to page 56 of The Autumn Statement confirms something we mentioned back in December, (Autumn Statement: Pro-Business but Individuals Will Suffer), which is that the proceeds from selling 4G licences were intended almost single-handedly to fund 'Growth and Enterprise', including the continued reduction in the headline Corporation Tax rate and the temporary hike in Annual Investment Allowance to £250,000 a year 'til December 2014.

£1.2 Billion is a very large gap to fill. I think it unlikely that the government will reverse its plans for Corporation Tax on the basis that it is too politically sensitive - Mr. Osborne is very keen for the UK plc to be seen as nice people to do business with. I suspect that instead, take-up of the enhanced AIA will be 'monitored' over the next 12 months and quietly dropped on the basis that so few people will have made use of it. But then, so few people could. (Editorial: Annual Investment Allowance - The Favoured Few) And given the transitional rules, many of those who can use it will want to wait until next year before trying to make full use of the E250,000. I'd be tempted to make use of the AIA in year 1, rather than trust to year 2. Of course we do have another Budget in a few weeks.

I imagine Mr. Osborne enjoying a few sleepless nights to come, feverishly trying to re-work his calculations to see if he can squeeze £1.2Billion out of somewhere to balance the books - maybe checking down the back of his sofa to see if there's any loose change to tide him over. Now we're all in this together, George. Now we are...