In his Budget speech today, George Osborne made out as if the Office for Budget Responsibility was worried about Britain leaving the EU and quoted it saying “a vote to leave in the forthcoming referendum could usher in an extended period of uncertainty”. Listening, I was amazed: how could he enlist the independent OBR on either side of the UK referendum debate?
But the document itself (Box 3.4, pdf) tells a very different story. Rather than take sides the OBR explicitly says “it is not for us to judge” – and quotes a study by Open Europe, a think tank, which…
… modelled a scenario in which the UK leaves the EU in 2018 and found that GDP could be 2.2 per cent lower or 1.6 per cent higher by 2030, depending on the arrangements for trade and regulation that follow ‘Brexit’.
But the point the OBR wanted to make was that any Brexit effects – good or bad – would take years.
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