Professor Michael McMahon:

We have had a bit of discussion on this already. Four years ago, we had current spending and capital spending, but it was just spending. We introduced the concept of core spending, as opposed to non-core spending, because of the unique nature of Covid. We and the Government thought it was sensible to exclude that spending from those regular accounts. As I have argued already today, I do not believe it is purely related to a temporal nature of spending. It makes no sense to me to link it to where you think the financing of that spending is coming from. Non-core spending should be reserved for spending that we think of as separate from the normal spending and everyday business of the Government. The normal everyday business of the Government involves sometimes providing extra supports, temporary or more permanent. Therefore, it should all just be part of core spending, in our view.