"All forecasts have to be treated with a pinch of salt because they are wrong so often. Before the OBR was founded Government forecast were done by the Treasury. In June 2007 it's central forecast for the middle of 2009 was for growth of 2.5%. It estimated that there was a 90% probability that growth would be between 0.8% and 4.2%. That's a pretty wide range for them to be right but they still weren't. Actual growth.......minus 6%!"

Er - didn't something fairly massive happen in 2008 - surely most people's predictions were wrong for this period?