OBR Fiscal Sustainability Report 2013 : eighth report of session 2013-14 : report, together with formal minutes /
Great Britain.Parliament.House of Commons.Treasury Committee.
Tyrie, Andrew.
Stationery Office (Great Britain)
London : The Stationery Office,
2014.
Under the Budget Responsibility and National Audit Act 2011, the OBR is currently required to publish this 50 year projection annually. The Treasury Committee is recommending that two FSRs be produced per Parliamentary cycle: the first within a year of a general election and the second at a time in the last two years of the Parliament that the OBR considers most appropriate for informing public debate. Annual forecasting is difficult enough: the one thing you can predict is that the forecast is likely to be wrong. Fifty year projections are little more than guesswork. The main value of the OBR's Fiscal Sustainability Report is not in the numbers generated but in flagging up - in broad aggregates - the possible long-term fiscal consequences of big government decisions. Two projections a Parliament should be ample: one reflecting measures at the end of the first year, during which incoming governments tend to enact their more far-reaching reforms, and one in the run-up to the general election, with the purpose of improving the quality of public debate.
HC 958.
"Session 2013-14".
Full text accessible when logged into Webcat.
"Published on 13 March 2014".
Chair: Mr Andrew Tyrie.
Under the Budget Responsibility and National Audit Act 2011, the OBR is currently required to publish this 50 year projection annually. The Treasury Committee is recommending that two FSRs be produced per Parliamentary cycle: the first within a year of a general election and the second at a time in the last two years of the Parliament that the OBR considers most appropriate for informing public debate. Annual forecasting is difficult enough: the one thing you can predict is that the forecast is likely to be wrong. Fifty year projections are little more than guesswork. The main value of the OBR's Fiscal Sustainability Report is not in the numbers generated but in flagging up - in broad aggregates - the possible long-term fiscal consequences of big government decisions. Two projections a Parliament should be ample: one reflecting measures at the end of the first year, during which incoming governments tend to enact their more far-reaching reforms, and one in the run-up to the general election, with the purpose of improving the quality of public debate.