Populist tendencies on the UK left, and the puzzle that never was

Don’t shoot the messager The Treasury Select Committee (TSC) has just published a report on the Office of Budget Responsibility, the UK’s Fiscal Council or Independent Fiscal Institution. It addresses in particular many calls from some on the left for reform of the OBR, amid claims that the OBR rather than the elected government is running fiscal policy. The TSC largely rejects such claims. It argues that critics, including those within government, “must resist the temptation to blame the messenger when confronted by politically difficult decisions in a fiscally constrained space.” It will come as no surprise to regular readers that I agree with the Select Committee’s conclusions. The OBR provides a fiscal forecast, and nothing more. It doesn’t choose the fiscal rules, or how the government meets those rules. In those circumstances describing the OBR as ‘undemocratic’ amounts to an attack on expertise rather than a call for greater democracy. Such calls reveal an unfortunate populist…