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How did we get to a position in which a fundamental item of data ceased to become important? That strikes me as utterly fundamental, both for assessing current spend and for future forecasting. For example, we might come across a disease that we do not yet know about and that has a proclivity for one sex or the other. We have to be able to project. How did we arrive at this position?

It is not exactly burdensome to learn someone’s sex.

Okay—thank you very much.

To finish off this point, I have a question for all the witnesses. Within the limitations of the Scottish Government’s powers, where do you see the biggest bang for buck in terms of increasing productivity? Professor Ruane, you have conceded that you are not as across all the limitations, so perhaps Dr Brewer or Professor Muscatelli can take that question.

I accept what you are saying because it might well mean that more housing is available at the bottom of the ladder. However, that is only if people can get the funding for it, which links into the wider economic environment.

A lot of stuff that I was going to ask about has been covered, so I will turn to the letter that you sent to the convener, Professor Roy. My question concerns sex and gender data for child disability payments. It would be useful to refresh our memory. My recollection—you can tell me if I am wrong—is that the data that is now being collected as part of the equality monitoring form is on gender, and that the equality monitoring form could be filled in by somebody else because it is being filled in on behalf of a child. Is that right?

There are multiple further questions, but I will leave them just now, in the interests of time.

My question is for Professor Chadha and it picks up on the Brexit point. I am on the Finance and Public Administration Committee and we had representatives of the Office for Budget Responsibility in yesterday. The OBR commented on Brexit in its economic and fiscal outlook report of November 2022, in which it said that Brexit had had “a significant adverse impact”, and it quoted various statistics about trade volumes falling 8.3 per cent below the present level by quarter 4 of 2023.

The OBR also made an interesting comment about trade intensity being

“15 per cent lower ... than if the UK had remained in the EU.”

Trade intensity is a measure of a country’s interaction with the world economy. I asked what the outlook was for that to continue, and they said that they anticipate that that will continue for at least another 15 years, despite the trade deals that have been done. Are you aware of those figures, and do you have any further reflections on the outlook as outlined in the OBR’s comments to committee yesterday?

Because I am aware of the time—and I appreciate the witnesses giving up their time—I will direct my final question to Professor Chadha only.

In talking about uncertainty, we talked about how to disaggregate data—Emma Congreve touched on that. Arguably, however, the past is a good predictor of the future. Given that the session is an overview of the current macroeconomic climate, it is worth pointing out some of the statistics about the UK. In 1999, only four of the 12 small advanced economies had a GDP per capita higher than the UK; by 2019, the figure was 11 out of 12. Even since the economic crisis, if the UK had matched the economic growth rates of other large economies, its economy would have been 4.4 per cent larger; if it had matched the growth rates of small advanced economies, its economy would have been 7.7 percent larger. We have considerable certainty, because we can look at the past.

Given those economic stats, to what extent can we be certain of continued decline—if the past is a good predictor of the future—and to what extent is our economy a “hipster” economy or otherwise?

Thank you for putting that on the record. I commented at the beginning that we had talked about that issue, and I understand and appreciate the difficulty in disaggregating data on the impact of Covid, the pandemic and Ukraine.

That said, we are now able to predict with slightly more certainty the impact of Brexit over the long term. Do you think that that issue is being talked about enough? Obviously, I have read your November report, but the issue keeps disappearing as though it is not going to have any long-term impact when, according to your figures, it quite clearly will have.

I saw that, too. It is an interesting area to look at, because it relates to the skills agenda as well as, for example, labour shortages.

Another question that I have is more about the scope of the OBR’s approach to the sustainability of public finances. The convener mentioned the removal of the Office of Tax Simplification; one area that I often like to ask about—indeed, I asked the IFS about it last week—is the cost to the UK’s GDP of money laundering and corruption. It is an absolutely significant factor, because it runs into billions every year.

I am not entirely sure whether the OBR has started to make an assessment of that, but it has a real cost. I was just wondering where issues such as the effect on the sustainability of public finances of this sort of cost to UK GDP fit within your organisation. Where in your organisation would you consider the implications of that, if at all?