October 19, 2018
Strong tax receipts and lower debt interest payments are sustaining a sharp fall in the budget deficit relative to last year. Extrapolating performance over the year to date would see the full-year deficit come in £11 billion lower than forecast in March, however the recent strength of cash corporation tax receipts is not yet being reflected in the headline deficit measure.
Since the announcement of the EU referendum we have been writing analysis on Brexit and its possible impact on the economy and public finances. We have complied our assumptions, judgements and analysis on this dedicated page.
We have published a new paper which presents our approach to in-year forecasting and monitoring of the public finances, and discusses how we assess our forecasts against the published data.
Due to the timing of the Budget, the 2018 Forecast evaluation report which is usually published in October has been postponed.
The independent European Fiscal Board, created to examine the EU fiscal framework and aggregate policy stance, has reviewed the work of the OBR in its Annual Report. It argues that the OBR has retained “a high degree of public trust in its ability to provide objective assessments of the macroeconomic outlook and public finances”.
July 17, 2018
Robert Chote distils the key messages from our latest Fiscal sustainability report – published today – in his press conference presentation and accompanying speaking note.
July 17, 2018
Our latest long-term projections again show that the ageing population and healthcare cost pressures threaten the sustainability of the public finances. The outlook is worse than last year, thanks largely to the Government’s as-yet unfunded announcement of extra health spending last month.
July 11, 2018
The Treasury Select Committee has approved the appointment of Andy King, currently OBR Chief of Staff, to join the Budget Responsibility Committee.
June 8, 2018
The Chancellor of the Exchequer has nominated Andy King to join the OBR’s Budget Responsibility Committee (BRC) and Bronwyn Curtis OBE to join the OBR’s oversight board as a non-executive member.
April 25, 2018
At the request of the Treasury Committee, the OBR has confirmed that it should be able to incorporate an October EU exit agreement in an early December Budget forecast, updating its existing Brexit assumptions as necessary. But it is not clear how firm or detailed the agreement will be and important policy questions are bound to remain unanswered.
March 13, 2018
Robert Chote distils the key messages from our latest Economic and fiscal outlook – published today – in his press conference presentation and accompanying speaking note.
March 13, 2018
We have revised GDP growth up a little in the near term thanks to a stronger world economy, but the medium-term outlook is little changed. And we have revised borrowing down thanks to stronger receipts, but the improvement is largely cyclical. So headroom against the Government’s fiscal targets is virtually unchanged from the autumn.
March 13, 2018
Relatively little time has passed since our November forecast and the outlook for the economy and public finances looks broadly the same. The economy has slightly more momentum in the near term, thanks to the unexpected strength of the world economy, but there seems little reason to change our view of its medium-term growth potential.
January 25, 2018
The introduction of universal credit (UC) is one of the most significant reforms to the welfare system since the Beveridge Report. It will replace six existing means-tested benefits and tax credits for people of working age, paying more than £60 billion a year to around 7 million households by the time it is fully rolled out.
January 25, 2018
The introduction of Universal Credit is forecast to reduce welfare spending by about £1bn a year by 2022-23. But the fiscal impact is much more uncertain than that suggests, according to our latest Welfare trends report.
December 21, 2017
Following Lord Burns’ appointment as Chairman of Ofcom, with effect from 1 January, he will step down as a non-executive member of the Office for Budget Responsibility with effect from 31 December. The process for appointing his successor will commence shortly.
November 16, 2016
The depth and breadth of the economic and fiscal analysis published by the OBR “can be considered as best-practice, and could be used as a benchmark by other advanced countries”, according to the International Monetary Fund’s Fiscal Transparency Evaluation for the UK. “While it is still relatively early in its track record, the OBR’s forecasting record indicates a lower degree of bias than under the Treasury forecasting regime.”