Speeches by Baldwin.

“So you looked at that, you decided not to do it, and it will not happen in this Parliament?”

“But it is baked in for next year.”

“The final IMF recommendation was that the family home should attract capital gains tax on sale, and I assume you have ruled that one out as well.”

“I add my congratulations on your appointment, Chancellor. I appreciate, as you will, just how much power and responsibility you have now, particularly with 400 MPs to vote through any measures you wish to implement. I recognise that one of the aspects of the financial world that you do not control is the markets. The O…”

“On the gilt market more specifically—there will be questions on those other topics as we go through—did you have conversations with the Debt Management Office or the Bank about the capacity of the gilt market to absorb that extra issuance as a result of the actions that you took?”

“Was the announcement at the IMF meetings about the change to the fiscal rules—that got the Speaker so upset with you—partly to prepare the markets for the impact of your Budget? Was that following advice?”

“I will come back in later, if I may.”

“On a completely different subject, I want to go back to the IMF. It struck me, as they welcomed your budget with their quote about “sustainably” raising revenue over the weekend, how many of the measures you have adopted are from their article IV report on the UK economy, and how many things that they set out in that r…”

“The second big thing that struck me that you might do in this Budget was around fuel duty. You have actually extended the 5p off fuel duty for another year. The Office for Budget Responsibility highlights the risk that eventually we will not have any fuel duty because we will all have moved to electric cars. Are you pl…”

“It will be 0.5 in total.”

“You think there will be twice the impact that the Office for Budget Responsibility—”

“Can you put a number on it? With a 1% move in interest rates that is not anticipated in your projections, how sensitive would that make the UK economy?”

“The entire headroom, basically.”

“Richard Hughes, you are the Office for Budget Responsibility. Is the new fiscal rule more or less responsible than the previous one?”

“Can I ask about those? My understanding is that one of the financial assets that is now in the public sector net financial liabilities is the student loan book. Is that in there at nominal value or at market-to-market value?”

“Can you just help us with that? Yesterday, an increase was announced in the student loan required to go to university. How much would an extra £100 show up as in public sector net financial liabilities?”

“The point is that it is the market-to-market value in the fiscal rules. That was what I was trying to get an answer to. The second question is about the pensions system. My understanding is that this new fiscal rule—public sector net financial liabilities—includes the net asset value of—Meg and I both should declare an…”

“How big is that?”

“It is not included in this fiscal rule. Okay. Is the debt interest accrued on the index-linked included in this fiscal rule? How are you accounting for that in your assessment?”

“Does anyone else have a different point of view on that? You all felt that what the Office for Budget Responsibility said was reasonable. In terms of the interaction with what the Bank of England is doing on quantitative tightening, does anyone have an opinion on how the gilt market might react in terms of the overall …”