Jeremy Hunt has rebuked the boss of the UK’s economic watchdog after he appeared to liken last year’s public finance forecasts to a “work of fiction”.

The Chancellor said Richard Hughes, the chairman of the Office for Budget Responsibility, was “wrong” and the comment “shouldn’t have been said”. 

Mr Hughes had told a House of Lords committee last month: “Some people call (the projections) a work of fiction, but that is probably being generous when someone has bothered to write a work of fiction and the Government hasn’t even bothered to write down what its departmental spending plans are underpinning the plans for public services.” 

Responding to the comment, Mr Hunt told the BBC’s Political Thinking podcast: “Those words are wrong and they shouldn’t have been said. Governments decide spending plans and spending reviews. 

“The next spending review will start in April 2025 and obviously until that point when that spending review is done we don’t publish our spending plans, no government ever has.”

Some economists argued that Mr Hunt’s tax giveaways at the Autumn Statement last November were based on “implausible” plans to cut public spending. 

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