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The budget coming up in a few weeks will be one of the big moments for Labour to set out their policy agenda.
Over the summer, the government set out what it considers a difficult public finance picture - including a supposed £22bn ‘black hole’. The Labour manifesto promised big improvements to public services, and the Prime Minister has since promised no return to austerity. Meanwhile, the Chancellor has promised that the upcoming Budget will be a ‘Budget for investment’. And there’s those promises to get debt falling, and not to raise the main rates of income tax or corporation tax, or to raise national insurance or VAT at all.
So how could they meet their fiscal targets while also fixing public services and increasing investment? What is the public finance picture looking like? And will there be enough resource to tackle some of the challenges facing the UK economy?
To explore these questions, Paul is joined by Carl Emmerson and Ben Zaranko.
Host
Paul Johnson
Paul has been the Director of the IFS since 2011. He is also currently visiting professor in the Department of Economics at University College London.
Participants
Ben Zaranko
Ben joined the IFS in 2017 and works across a range of areas, including UK fiscal policy and the productivity of the health and social care system.
Carl Emmerson
Carl, a Deputy Director, is an editor of the IFS Green Budget, an expert on the UK pension system and sits on the Social Security Advisory Committee.
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