Budget Responsibility and National Audit Bill [HL]

Listening to the previous debate, I am even more confused than I was before about which staff are now being employed by the OBR and what the plans are for the future. Perhaps the noble Lord can help us on that. I know from a Written Answer in which I got a proper answer from the noble Lord that 12 Treasury members were still working officially for the OBR—full time, I assume. As I now understand it, having listened to the previous discussion, there are a lot of non-executive members as well as executive members. Quality will be required in the new members of the OBR, but they will not necessarily be non-executive or executive members. I do not quite understand what we are talking about when we refer to ““staff””. For example, I understand that Robert Chote, quite rightly, retired from his position as head of the Institute for Fiscal Studies. I am not clear whether that institute is continuing with another head. I think that it probably is. I see the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, nodding—perhaps she is the new chair—but it is just adding to the 50-odd independent forecasters that we have, or whatever the number was before, plus one. I should be glad if the noble Lord could clarify that. In Amendment 12, my noble friend Lord Peston and I say that the staff must not be civil servants, because we were both worried about them either remaining as officials of the Treasury or being temporarily transferred to the OBR, which we would not find very satisfactory. The whole point about the OBR is that not only must it be independent, which I am sure it will be, but it must be seen to be independent. If we are not careful, because of its proximity to the Chancellor and the Treasury, it will not necessarily be seen to be as independent as it should be. For example, on the previous amendment my noble friend Lord Myners talked about the OBR moving its office to Victoria Street. However, it may be moving to the offices of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills for all I know. Perhaps the Minister can clarify that as well. My noble friend was worried about whether they would have to keep traipsing backward and forward between the OBR offices and the Treasury, rather than inviting any Treasury officials to whom they want to talk to come to them. The foreword of the recent OBR report makes it clear that it sees not only the Treasury. It states that, "““we have also drawn heavily on the help and expertise of officials across government””." There is a whole load of them, including Revenue and Customs, and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. The OBR officials go to lots of offices, so there is a wide-scale connection with government. I do not object to them seeing officials in government departments—that is sensible—but it makes me wonder, when I see the number of departments that the OBR visits, just how big it is, or is going to be. Perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Sassoon, could tell us how many staff the OBR has now, how many are full time, how many are part time, how many are quality, how many are not quality—doing the footwork, you might say—how many are experts, how many are executive, and how many are part-time executive. For example, are Robert Chote and the two people with him full time or part time? I do not know. Unfortunately, I have not seen the minutes of the Treasury Select Committee, where the answers may have already been given. Perhaps the Minister can tell us. I beg to move.