On Thursday 27 March, Tom Josephs, Member of the Budget Responsibility Committee, will discuss the Spring Statement. He will be joined by Tom Wickstead, who leads the OBR’s Indirect Effects team.
Tom Josephs joined the Budget Responsibility Committee in September 2023. After starting his career in a private sector consultancy, Tom worked in HM Treasury from 2000 to 2010 in a range of roles covering macroeconomics, Budget policy coordination, and fiscal analysis and forecasting. In 2010 he was appointed to the OBR as its first Chief of Staff and led the establishment and development of the organisation in its early years. In 2013, Tom joined the International Monetary Fund as a Senior Economist in the Fiscal Affairs Department providing advice on fiscal policy, analysis and institutions in a range of countries in Africa, the Middle East and Europe.
He returned to the UK Civil Service in 2016, first as Director of Trade Policy at the Department for International Trade, then from 2019 as Director of Fiscal Group leading HM Treasury’s work on fiscal policy and government financing through Covid, and then from 2022 at the Department for Work and Pensions as Director for Private Pensions.
Tom Wickstead has led the Indirect Effects team at the Office for Budget Responsibility since 2023, analysing the macroeconomic impact of Government policy changes. Before that, he spent two years heading up the OBR’s Economic Analysis and Modelling team. He has been part of the Government Economic Service for over nine years altogether, with previous roles at the Treasury and OBR covering fiscal policy and analysis, climate, economic forecasting, and EU exit.
The event will be chaired by Catherine Connolly, economicsense. A member of the SPE Council, Catherine is the founder of economicsense, a specialist economics training provider. Catherine was in the British Civil Service between 2001 and 2018 where she was a member of the Government Economic Service and the Senior Civil Service.
This event will be held live via Zoom from 11.00am-12.00pm.
Members can register via the SPE office notices. Email admin@spe.org.uk