UK shoppers are planning a £16.5bn spending spree this Christmas

The majority of gift-givers will be spending a total of £282.70 on presents, an increase of 3.5 per cent, according to research

(Corbis)

With all the piddling autumnal distractions such as Halloween and the fireworks out of the way, the road is now clear for your reservoir of cash to be comprehensively siphoned off into whichever supermarket reward scheme your debit card calls home. And this year looks like being the biggest Christmas spend ever.

I know this because of the helpful involvement of Retail Times, which quotes research from Webloyalty, saying that the overall festive budget is getting bigger (I told you!), with the UK planning a £16.5bn shopping spree, up 2.5 per cent on last year. Indeed, it seems an impressive 17.6 per cent of people plan to spend more on Christmas gifts this year, which suggests one of two things. Either it's the percentage of people who find themselves in a new relationship (and thus have a new boyfriend or girlfriend to impress and finally see naked) or their face is still stinging from last year's unpleasantness, when they reasoned that a Terry's chocolate orange was an adequate main Christmas gift for their wife of 23 years.

Actually, the majority of gift-givers will be spending a total of £282.70 on presents, an increase of 3.5 per cent. This breaks down for the average consumer to a Yuletide spend of £442. Break it down even more and you find that, for the majority of people, more than half of this outlay will go towards actual presents. The rest goes on food and drink (and Matchmakers).

I have no idea how much I and my wife will end up spending on Christmas. Our little boy will be just over eight months come the big day, so in all honesty we could buy him an empty box of Honey Monster Puffs and he would be perfectly content. Well, I say "buy".

Depressingly, babies must be the hardest of all people to shop for. It isn't easy to work out what your wee one wants for Christmas when a) they have no concept of the festival; and b) all they really want is the contents of your wife's bra and a cuddly hippo (called Hamish) to squeeze. I tried to explain this to my best friend the other day. He called to ask what our little chap might be in the market for. Now, being a father of two lovely girls, he should know this was an impossible question to answer. But ask it he did. I told him I would have a think. Hopefully he won't ask again until around Easter.

As to what I shall be buying my wife this year, I must confess that I still owe her a "push present" (what women get after they have a baby), as well as an anniversary gift. It was our third anniversary in September, which is traditionally celebrated with gifts made of leather. She got me a very nice wallet and asked only for some new boots in return. I tell you this, If I don't pull my finger out and buy them before the year has expired, I have a good guess where the toe end of the boots will be going, irrespective of how much I spend on her Christmas present.