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Autumn Forecast

I think the shadow Chancellor made the mistake of writing his response before he had seen the OBR's forecast. He predicated all of it on there somehow being lower growth, when in fact growth is higher in every quarter and every year than was predicted in the June forecast. I assume that he also wrote his response before the European Commission produced its forecast today. I am sure that he has now seen it. He read out a list of countries, but the European Commission predicts that over the next two years we will grow more quickly than Germany, France, the United States of America, Japan, the eurozone and the EU average. If one is going to read out a list of countries, one might as well start with the most accurate and recent forecast for their economies. As I have said, the shadow Chancellor's response was not much of an analysis of what the OBR has said today. He skated over the fact that because of the welfare changes that we have introduced, we have been able to reduce the public sector headcount reduction that is required by any deficit reduction plan—including, presumably, the plan that he will one day propose. He should at least acknowledge that the welfare changes achieve that. He and the leader of his party have some important choices to make in the next few months as we vote on some of these measures. They must decide whether they will support welfare reform or would rather see a higher number of public sector job losses, but that will be a decision for them. The shadow Chancellor said that he did not believe in the rebalancing of the economy, and that the assumptions for exports and investment that I had made were fanciful. They are, of course, the estimates made by this independent body, the appointment of whose members, as I have said, was ratified by the Treasury Committee. The shadow Chancellor accused me of having no alternative measures to present. I thought that that was a bit of a cheek, because as far as I can tell the Labour party has a blank sheet of paper as its new economic policy. He talked of the importance of protecting intellectual property and supporting the growth of patents, and then praised, I believe, James Dyson. The last time I checked, it was we, rather than the shadow Chancellor, who had consulted him, but so be it. ... Ah. Well, I am sure that Lord Drayson also had some interesting things to say. [Interruption.] I welcome, by the way—[Interruption.] ... I welcome the support that the Opposition have given to our decision to offer a bilateral loan to Ireland. We will have to put legislation before the House, and I will of course keep the shadow Chancellor informed of the details when they are negotiated along with the IMF, eurozone and other bilateral contributions. I should have mentioned that Sweden and Denmark have also provided bilateral loans. I come back, however, to the point that this forecast shows 1 million new jobs being created over the next four or five years. It also shows growth of over 2% in each year; it shows the economy rebalancing; it shows Britain getting to grips with its debts. Yet all the shadow Chancellor could come up with was this: he said he had read a Financial Times editorial in the last week—and I note from his interview this morning that that is how he does his homework; he says he photocopies articles from the FT. Well, I went one better and actually got a copy of the FT, and he said this in his FT interview this morning:"““I am a great believer in the philosophy that if you've not got anything to say, keep your mouth shut””." Very good.