HM TREASURY. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE. EMBARGOED UNTIL SUCH TIME AS IT APPEARS IN A NEWSPAPER.

HM Treasury today announced that, with effect from this autumn, the Budget will be replaced by the period of speculation that has traditionally preceded it. The change follows an internal review, which found that the speculation already performs every function of the Budget, lasts roughly six times as long, and enjoys a markedly better attendance record among commentators.

Background

The department has long observed that no proposal is considered credible by the public, the markets or the press until it has been ruled out on at least two separate occasions. A measure that has been floated, denied, re-floated and then denied again by a source described as ‘close to the department’ is generally understood to be fully settled policy. The formal Budget statement, which arrives some weeks later, was found to add nothing to this process except a lectern.

“We looked carefully at what the Budget was for, and the honest answer was that it confirmed things everybody had already stopped being surprised by in October. Retiring it seemed the proportionate response.” Margaret Pendlebury, Director of Fiscal Communications, HM Treasury

Efficiency savings

The department estimates that the move will release several thousand hours of official time previously spent drafting a statement that would be read aloud once, at speed, to a room that was already shouting. It will also remove the need for the red box, which has been in continuous service since before anybody could say why, and which the department confirmed will be retained for sentimental reasons and to carry sandwiches.

Speculation, by contrast, requires no formal announcement, no costings and no fixed end date. It may be conducted from any location, including a television studio in Westminster, a breakfast radio slot, or the back of a taxi.

“The beauty of the new arrangement is that nobody can be held to anything,” said Alan Whitcombe, Head of Anticipatory Policy. “Under the previous system we occasionally had to do the thing we had said we would do. That placed a burden on the department which we are pleased to have lifted.”

Support for affected households

The Treasury recognises that a number of households have already adjusted their finances in response to three or more mutually contradictory rumours. A dedicated helpline has therefore been established for anyone who has this month increased their pension contributions, withdrawn them, and purchased a small quantity of gold bullion on the strength of a Sunday newspaper.

The helpline operates Monday to Friday, between 9am and 5pm. Callers are asked to note that guidance given on a Monday may not apply on the Tuesday, and that the adviser on the line will probably have done the same things themselves.

“I moved my ISA twice and my husband moved it back,” said Janet Okafor, an independent financial planner from Reading. “We are now in the same position we started in, only with a spreadsheet and a lingering sense of having been had.”

The department also noted that the only fiscal event of the autumn that could be forecast with any confidence remains the clocks going back, which will proceed as scheduled and which no commentator has yet suggested ruling out.

Notes to Editors

1. The Treasury cannot be defamed and wishes it to be known that it has checked.

2. References to ‘sources close to the department’ should be understood as referring to anybody who has at any point stood near the department, including the man who services the lifts.

3. Any figure appearing in coverage of the speculation should be treated as provisional, final, or both, depending on the day.

4. The speculation will be held at a time and in a form to be confirmed. It has, in the department’s view, already started.

5. Requests for comment on this release will be neither confirmed nor denied, then denied, then confirmed.

6. Journalists seeking clarification on any of the above should contact the Treasury press office, where somebody will be able to tell them that nothing has been ruled in or out.