UK Budget Preview 1: What are fiscal rules, why do we have them, and could they be made better?

With the UK Budget approaching, speculation is mounting that Chancellor Rachel Reeves is considering changing the fiscal rules that the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) uses to assess whether the Government is meeting its budgetary targets. So it’s worth thinking about how they have come about, and to what extent the rumoured changes are (i) sensible and (ii) likely to make a difference.