Jeremy Hunt has accused the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) of abandoning political impartiality over the publication of a review that looks set to criticise the transparency of the last government’s fiscal plans.
The budget watchdog is expected to assess the transparency of the last government’s spending plans, reviewing an alleged £22 billion “black hole” left by the Conservatives.
Writing to the OBR on Friday, the shadow chancellor said: “I do not believe publishing a review with criticisms of the main opposition party on the day of a budget is consistent with political impartiality.”
Hunt added that doing so without “asking for the views” of former ministers would amount to a “political intervention.”
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In a reply to Hunt, the OBR chairman Richard Hughes said its review would solely concern the institutional relationship between the OBR and the Treasury and address the “adequacy of the information and assurances” provided by the last government.
He added that the watchdog did not consider it “necessary, or appropriate, given the possible market sensitivity of some of the information contained therein, to provide ministers of the previous government with access to the contents of the report and its conclusions before publication.”
The comments come as Keir Starmer promises to embrace the “harsh light of fiscal reality” ahead of the autumn budget on Wednesday — one of the most significant financial statements in recent history.
The prime minister will warn of “unprecedented” economic challenges and invite the public to judge him on his ability to rise to them in a major speech on Monday.
He will say the budget will “ignore the populist chorus of easy answers” with a series of expected tax hikes, including an increase to employer national insurance by at least one percentage point.
Referring to the fiscal statements announced by former Labour and Conservative chancellors Gordon Brown and George Osborne, the prime minister will say: “We have to be realistic about where we are as a country. This is not 1997, when the economy was decent but public services were on their knees.
“And it’s not 2010, where public services were strong, but the public finances were weak. These are unprecedented circumstances.
“And that’s before we even get to the long-term challenges ignored for 14 years: an economy riddled with weakness on productivity and investment, a state that needs urgent modernisation to face down the challenge of a volatile world.”
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