Please see below a copy of the OBR* report that the Chancellor referenced during the Government’s Coronavirus update yesterday. The report contains OBR’s initial assessment of what the coronavirus lockdown will do to the economy, jobs and government borrowing. It does not make for comfortable reading as the headline figures suggested the prospect of a 35% fall in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) during Q2 and unemployment rising to 10%. The Chancellor stressed that the forecast was only one possible scenario, but the OBR figures suggest that the scale of what the UK is facing “will have serious implications for our economy”.
The report does not attempt to predict how long the economic lockdown will last – which is a matter for Government – but one key pointer is that it was modelled on a three month lockdown period followed by three months of partial restrictions as a way of illustrating some of the financial effects.
Access full report:
*The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) was set up in the aftermath of the financial crisis and is independent of the government. Its job is to provide independent economic forecasts to Ministers.