Last week's Autumn Statement was billed by many as the
"Brexit budget". With the next one due to take place just
four months before the UK officially leaves the EU, this was
perhaps the last opportunity for the Chancellor to make funding
decisions that will take effect on the UK economy before
Brexit.
This Budget was also set against a backdrop of 17 months'
economic data that shows how Brexit is impacting - so whilst the
Chancellor stated early in his speech that it was "about much
more than Brexit", clearly the measures announced will be
viewed in a Brexit context.
The latest OBR forecast predicts average UK GDP growth of 1.4%
until 2021, which is noticeably behind the Euro area and Brexit has
undoubtedly contributed to the slowdown. However, the latest
downward revisions by the OBR were predominately based on the
UK's consistently weak productivity, which has long lagged
behind that of other major economies. In our
Power Up report, we talked about Brexit as a
