Book ChapterThe 2019 Spending Round, published in September 2019, set departmental budgets for the 2020−21 financial year. Chancellor Sajid Javid topped up the spending plans pencilled in by his predecessor, announced spending increases across the board and declared austerity to be over. But these increases must be seen in context: austerity may have ‘ended’ but it is far from undone. And a decade of spending restraint means that even after recent announcements, spending on public services next year will be well below where we might have expected it to be, given historical rates of spending growth and growth in national income.