Professor Michael McMahon:

I am in my fifth year on the council. Every year with every budget there are things that we go back and forth with it on. As the OECD's review of 2021 highlighted, there are definitely fiscal councils that have better access to information. The Office for Budget Responsibility, OBR, in the UK has a right to access information. It is the gold standard and we do not have that. I would describe the working relationship as generally good. We go back and forth. It does not always get answered in one email. There is often clarifications on clarifications.