A cross-party group of MPs on the Treasury committee has issued a formal defense of the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), the government’s independent economic forecaster. In recent months, the OBR has faced significant criticism from both the left and the right regarding the accuracy and impact of its economic projections. The committee explicitly rejected demands from some political factions to fundamentally reform or dismantle the agency, arguing that the OBR should not be held responsible for the difficult policy decisions necessitated by the current state of public finances.

Despite this defense, the committee acknowledged that the OBR’s current reporting structure could be improved. The MPs suggested that ministers should instruct the agency to produce a 10-year economic forecast. This would serve as a middle ground between the OBR’s current five-year short-term outlooks and its long-term 50-year fiscal sustainability reports. The committee emphasized that the OBR provides a necessary service for transparency, and that blaming the agency for unfavorable economic data is an attempt to deflect from the underlying political challenges facing the government. The report concludes that while the OBR’s methodology is not beyond scrutiny, the current political attacks are counterproductive to sound economic governance.