Seòmar agus comataidhean

Would you not therefore have expected to see incentives to encourage investment in AI, rather than the investment in plant and machinery that we spoke about earlier?

That long-range looking back and the figures that you have set out are very helpful. I was not entirely clear from the autumn statement what the significant trigger factors would be that would make the change from what you have set out as the position over the past 15 years. In fairness, some of that is because of the lack of flexibility for all the areas that we have discussed, such as debt servicing and so on. Correct me if I am wrong and being somewhat pessimistic.

I appreciate that talking about technology can be very complex, but what consideration are you giving to the impact that artificial intelligence might have on productivity? I understand that any answer will, in essence, be wrong, but what is your thinking? That is one area that could have an impact.

Good morning. This has been fascinating. I will pick up on a couple of points and bottom them out. Professor Miles, we talked about productivity earlier, and you suggested that your forecast may be on the optimistic side. The freezing of public sector capital expenditure is obviously a fall in real terms. Will that have an impact? Logically, it would. Therefore, what is your feeling about how this continual limitation in capital expenditure will ultimately affect productivity? Will you flesh that out a bit more?

My last question concerns Brexit, which I know you have baked into numbers generally. For a period of time, it was difficult to disaggregate the data, given what was happening with wider geopolitical issues such as the energy crisis. My guess is that it is only the longer-run forecasts and the evidence therein that will start to show, or at least allow us to apportion some data to, the impact of Brexit. Am I right or wrong in that?

Thank you.

Good morning. I have just one question, which is related to inflation and, therefore, debt payments on PPI-type models. I have not heard a lot of talk about that. Obviously, various public sector bodies have seen massive increases in their repayments. Although we can take a view on what the OBR predicts about future inflation, I imagine that it will need to be considerably more cautious, in that when inflation goes down, it goes down. There is a clear link. Can you give me some more guidance on that? Also, what behavioural impacts—if any—will there be for finance executives in public sector organisations who are managing those greatly increased PPI payments?

It sounds as though, collectively, we do not know a great deal about the data and the impact of it. It strikes me as quite interesting that, if we are looking at the longer-term trajectory, even though we all assume that inflation will come down—which I think is correct—we also agree that it will not come down to the historically low levels that we previously had. It strikes me that it would be interesting to work through the impact of that on a variety of public sector organisations. I realise that I do not know about the issue, so perhaps it is heartening that you do not, either—I do not know. Anyway, thank you.

In fairness, it might be; the issue might be my ignorance. If we have the data, we can start to interrogate what the impact could be, and how that plays into the real economy, which is why I am asking.

In part, you have answered one of my follow-up questions about the external assessment. You mentioned your software provider but, again, its view is only as good as its view of the world, and part of the challenge is the exponential speed of change. Would you consider consulting wider expertise? Do you have that in your sights?