A further £102m in charity funding from bank fines was among the headline voluntary sector issues to emerge from this year's Autumn Statement, delivered by Chancellor Philip Hammond this week.

The statement also contained news on Gift Aid and the Gift Aid Small Donations scheme, social investment tax relief (SITR), updates on the Tampon Tax, and more.

The funding from fines on banks for interest rate rigging will be distributed among more than 100 projects. Funded projects will support armed forces personnel, their families and veterans.

Funding will be directed over the next four years to emergency service personnel support, children’s hospitals, air ambulances and emergency responders, and museums and memorials.

The Government has committed to giving intermediaries a greater role in administering Gift Aid, and amending the Gift Aid Small Donations Scheme to make it more accessible and flexible.

Hammond announced that Comic Relief will administer £3m in funding to a range of women's charities, as part of the Tampon Tax initiative of offsetting VAT paid on sanitary products with government funding to causes directly benefitting women.

The amount social enterprises can raise through SITR will increase to £1.5m From 6 April 2017, with a further review of the relief to be conducted within two years of its expansion.

While the additional funding for charities and improvements to the Gift Aid and SITR regimes have been broadly welcomed, many in the sector criticised the Chancellor's statement for not going far enough. Read the reaction here.

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