The war in the Middle East has sent oil and gas prices soaring – and Britain remains deeply exposed to global energy markets. If the shocks persist they will feed directly into household bills, business costs and inflation. On Tuesday, the Office for Budget Responsibility released projections that were finalised before the US-Israeli strikes began. Rachel Reeves was right to warn that household bills might rise. But she gave no clue as to whether her policy would be flexible enough to respond if they did.
In her spring statement the chancellor argued for fiscal discipline. That’s understandable. The OBR says borrowing will fall and that the “headroom” against her self-imposed rules has increased. Her message was that Britain needed “stability”. The logic is that discipline reassures markets, and that keeps borrowing affordable. But markets constrain the UK only insofar as its institutions let them. If energy prices spike, the economy suffers a drop in real income. The question is: who soaks up that loss? Households, firms or the state, via higher deficits? Privileging fiscal credibility might signal that she prefers households to absorb the shock rather than the state.
