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Budget Responsibility and National Audit Bill [HL]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell, has already referred to the fact that I did not support the OBR carrying out an assessment of its own forecasts, as set out in Clause 4. I stick by that view, for the reasons that the noble Lord has given. However, I cannot support his amendment because, without another amendment, it would take out of the Bill a requirement for any assessment of the accuracy of OBR forecasts. I do not understand why the noble Lord has not grouped this amendment with later ones that would set up a peer review committee to perform this function. It would be a retrograde step simply to take out of the Bill a requirement for an analysis of the accuracy of the OBR’s fiscal and economic forecasts. I would rather have an unsatisfactory review than none at all.