Brexit has turned politicians into economic forecasters, either predicting that the economy and hence the public finances will tank after March 2019 or boom, depending on their views. In the middle of this cacophony of predictions sits the independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) which has to make its own projections shorn of political bias.

Its chairman Robert Chote made a rare public appearance last week in an interview at the Institute for Government (IfG). In it he stressed that the IfG’s remit, since it was created in 2010, has been to ‘to increase transparency about public finance forecasts’. He added: ‘I can’t promise to produce more accurate forecasts but it’s easier for technocrats to forecast than politicians who have to stick to conviction forecasting until it’s obvious their forecasts don’t work.’ He went on: ‘All government decisions are based on forecasts of some kind. When forecasters get things wrong all economists get the blame.’