OBR warns of 'significant' risks to public finances

Rapid succession of shocks

Significant fiscal risks no longer loom in the distance as shocks to the public finances are proving more frequent, severe and costly, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has said.

In a report published today (13 July), the UK's fiscal watchdog said the 2020s were "turning out to be a very risky era for the public finances", highlighting the coronavirus pandemic, the energy and cost-of-living crisis and the sudden interest rate hikes as events that have already hit the economy severely this decade. "This rapid succession of shocks has delivered the deepest recession in three centuries, the sharpest rise in energy prices since the 1970s, and the steepest sustained rise in borrowing costs since the 1990s," it said. "And they have pushed government borrowing to its...