Fiscal sustainability report – January 2017

Our 2017 Fiscal sustainability report sets out long-term projections for spending, revenue and financial transactions, and assesses whether they imply a sustainable path for public sector debt.

This FSR was due to be published in July 2016 but was delayed following the EU exit referendum result. Instead we published extracts of the FSR in our Fiscal sustainability analytical paper series in July – September 2016.
We have now moved from an annual publication timetable to biennial to align with the frequency of the ONS population projections.

 

Click here to explore the long-term projections in our interactive tool

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Fiscal sustainability report – January 2017

January 17, 2017 – 2.41 MB

Supporting documents

Boxes

Within each of our key publications we include topical ‘boxes’. These self-contained analyses are unique to this publication and tend to cover recent developments in the economy or public finances that complement the main discussion of our analyses.

Other cost pressures in the health sector

Other cost pressures in the health sector
Over the past four decades, health spending in the UK rose faster than GDP (on average in real terms) and it increased steadily in real per capita terms. Demographic change alone could have not explained these rising trends, with other factors expected to provide further upward pressures on health spending. This box summarised the key findings of our WP No. 9 that reviewed the latest evidence on demographic and non-demographic determinants of health spending in the UK and its implications for our long-term health spending projections.

Public sector net financial liabilities

Public sector net financial liabilities
At Autumn Statement 2016 the Government asked us to forecast two new balance sheet metrics: PSND excluding the Bank of England and public sector net financial liabilities (PSNFL), a broader measure covering all the public sector’s financial assets and liabilities recorded in the National Accounts. This box presented our long-term projections for these two new balance sheet metrics with particular focus on PSNFL as PSND with and without the Bank of England tended to converge in our medium-term forecast and were expected to continue to do so over the long-term.