Downing Street Says » Office for Budget Responsibility

» Friday, July 9, 2010

Office for Budget Responsibility

Asked when the Government became aware that the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) had made changes to their forecast regarding job losses, the PMS said that reporters should speak to the Treasury about the process leading up to the Budget. The most important point was that this was the OBR’s forecast and it was independent.

Asked if the Government had told the civil service that no one would get promoted as the OBR suggested, the PMS said no.

Put that the OBR had also assumed that the Government would put less into peoples’ pensions, the PMS said that reporters should speak to the OBR about their forecasts. There was a review of public sector pensions being led by John Hutton.

Asked if the OBR was wrong in its assumptions, the PMS said that in the context of their forecast the OBR was making some assumptions.

Asked if the Government had told OBR to come up with a different number, the PMS said that it was OBR’s forecast.

Put that the OBR needed to be put on to a statutory footing, the PMS said that that had always been the intention. The process prior to that would be that Sir Alan Budd would provide advice to the Treasury on the establishment of the OBR, which would feed into their proposals that would form the basis of the bill.

Asked when the bill would be, the PMS said it was most likely to be in the autumn.

Asked if the Treasury Select Committee (TSC) would be allowed to select the head of the OBR, the PMS said that he was sure the TSC would have ample opportunity to speak to the OBR head once appointed and cross-examine them after the publication of future forecasts.

Asked about who would appoint the head of the OBR, the PMS said reporters should speak to the Treasury about process.

Asked what sort of role the OBR would have during the spending review, the PMS said that the OBR would not have a significant role in the spending review; its role concerned fiscal policy and producing independent forecasts.

No Comments »

No comments yet.

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Post a public comment

Name (required)
E-mail (required)
(You must give an email address, but it will not be displayed to the public.)
Website
(You may give your website, and it will be displayed to the public.)

Comments:

This is not a way of contacting the Prime Minister. If you would like to contact the Prime Minister, go to the 10 Downing Street official site.

Privacy note: Shortly after posting, your name and comment will be displayed on the site. This means that people searching for your name on the Internet will be able to find and read your comment.

Original PMOS briefings are © Crown Copyright. Crown Copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen's Printer for Scotland. Click-use licence number C02W0004089. Material is reproduced from the original 10 Downing Street source, but may not be the most up-to-date version of the briefings, which might be revised at the original source. Users should check with the original source in case of revisions. Comments are © Copyright contributors. Everything else is © Copyright Downing Street Says.