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Changelog

Source: NEWS.md

obr 0.5.0

Full EFO detailed-forecast-table coverage (39 of 39)

This release closes the v0.3.x feedback that “the range of forecast lines was fairly limited” by exposing every detailed-forecast table in the EFO Aggregates and Economy workbooks. v0.4.x exposed 4. v0.5.0 exposes all 39: 35 via standard layout parsers, 2 via bespoke layout parsers (subsector_matrix for Table 6.4, quarterly_indented for Table 6.10), and 2 via cross-reference auto-follow to the previous EFO vintage (Tables 6.11 and 6.15, which OBR redirects to Tables 6.2 and 6.5 of the November 2025 EFO).

New: get_efo_table() and obr_efo_catalogue()

  • obr_efo_catalogue() returns a data frame describing every detailed- forecast table the package can fetch: table_id, file, section, title, layout, default metric_type, default unit. Use this to discover what’s available.
  • get_efo_table(table_id, vintage, refresh) is the generic dispatcher. Pass any catalogue id (e.g. "6.13", "1.19", "6.1") and get the parsed contents back in the standard v0.4.0 schema (period, period_type, series, metric_type, value, unit).

get_efo_fiscal() and get_efo_economy() are now thin wrappers over the dispatcher and continue to work unchanged. Series names for the single-series Economy tables (output gap, nominal GDP, electricity price) are preserved via internal overrides so v0.4.x scripts still match.

New layouts handled

The dispatcher routes each table to one of:

  • quarterly_wide periods in col 2 (Q1/Q2 strings), series across
  • quarterly_single periods in col 2, single value column to the right
  • annual_year_wide calendar years as column headers, series in col 2
  • annual_period_wide calendar years in col 2 (rows), series across
  • fiscal_year_wide fiscal years as column headers, series in col 2
  • subsector_matrix single fiscal year, series in col 2, sub-sector in column headers (used for Table 6.4); adds a sub_sector extra column
  • quarterly_indented “Q1 2016” format periods in col 3, value in col 4, with Outturn/Forecast section markers in col 2 (used for Table 6.10)
  • cross_reference sheet redirects to a previous EFO; the dispatcher follows the redirect, fetches the named vintage, and returns the linked table with provenance pointing at the previous vintage

Classifier hardening

Tightened classify_metric_type() so the v0.5.0 expanded coverage tags each row correctly:

  • Index-linked gilts (and similar) is no longer classified as metric_type = "index". The “index” pattern now requires Index at the end of the series name or an explicit (2015=100) / (2010=100) base-year tag. Net-debt composition (Table 6.13) now correctly tags every row as pct.
  • Bare change no longer triggers yoy_pct because OBR uses “change in X” for level differences too (e.g. Adjustment for the change in pension entitlements, in £bn). Explicit YoY signals (growth, inflation, y/y, yoy, year on year, % change, annual %) still trigger.

obr 0.4.0

Breaking: standard tidy long schema for the EFO / PFD / HFD / WTR / FSR functions

This release standardises the columns returned by the data-fetching functions backing the Public Finances Databank (PFD), Economic and Fiscal Outlook (EFO), Historical Forecasts Database (HFD), Welfare Trends Report (WTR), and Fiscal Risks and Sustainability Report (FSR) so they can be rbind()’d, joined, plotted, and reasoned about the same way regardless of which OBR publication produced them. Driven by feedback from Ben Northcott (Office for Budget Responsibility) on the v0.3.x release.

The Forecast Revisions Database (get_forecast_revisions()) and Policy Measures Database (get_policy_measures()) keep their existing multi-dimensional schemas in v0.4.0; migrating them to the standard schema is queued for a later release.

All long-format outputs from the EFO / PFD / HFD / WTR / FSR functions now share the columns:

  • period - the time period as a character string
  • period_type - one of "fiscal_year", "quarter", "calendar_year"
  • series - the variable name
  • metric_type - one of "level", "yoy_pct", "index", "pct", "pct_pts"
  • value - the numeric value
  • unit - one of "gbp_bn", "pct", "pct_pts", "index", "count_k", etc.

get_forecasts() adds forecast_date as a leading column. get_pension_projections() adds scenario_type as a trailing column.

Migration

Old column New column
year, fiscal_year period (with period_type to disambiguate)
value_bn, psnb_bn, psnd_bn, tme_bn value (with unit = "gbp_bn")
pct_gdp (FSR pension projections) value (with unit = "pct")
scenario (FSR) series

get_psnb(), get_psnd(), get_expenditure() now return the standard long schema and tag rows with series = "PSNB", "PSND", "TME" respectively rather than collapsing the value into a series-named column.

CPI Index vs YoY split (the headline fix)

In v0.3.x, calling get_efo_economy("inflation") returned CPI Index values (~135) and CPI YoY growth values (~2.1) in the same value column with no machine-readable distinction between them. v0.4.0 tags every row with a metric_type ("index" for index levels, "yoy_pct" for growth rates, "pct" for shares, etc.) and a matching unit, so callers can filter or facet on metric type directly.

This is the v0.4.0 fix for the bug Ben Northcott raised on 2026-04-29: “If I pull e.g. the CPI forecast the index value and the YoY growth rate appear in the same ‘value’ column. Probably an additional column in long format indicating YoY or Index would be useful.”

New helpers

  • classify_metric_type() (internal): heuristic classifier for series names. Returns "index", "yoy_pct", "pct", "pct_pts", or "level". Used by every parser to populate metric_type from raw source labels.
  • default_unit_for_metric() (internal): maps a metric_type to its default unit. For "level" returns NA (caller must supply since a level can be gbp_bn, count_mn, etc.).
  • obr_long() (internal): canonical constructor for the v0.4.0 schema. All parsers use this to build their tidy long output.

Constants

  • OBR_PERIOD_TYPES, OBR_METRIC_TYPES, OBR_UNITS: controlled vocabularies for the schema metadata columns. Internal but documented in the package source.

New: workflow helpers

  • obr_compare_vintages(vintage_a, vintage_b, what) joins the same EFO table from two vintages on the standard schema and returns a tidy diff with value_a, value_b, and revision = value_b - value_a. Supports what = "fiscal" (default), "inflation", "labour", or "output_gap".
  • obr_actual_vs_forecast(series) joins the long-format Historical Forecasts Database against PFD outturn for the same series, returning one row per (forecast vintage, fiscal year) with the realised forecast error. Supports series = "PSNB", "PSND", or "expenditure".

Both helpers feed naturally into the kind of forecast-evaluation tables the OBR’s own Forecast Evaluation Report uses.

New: vignette

  • vignette("efo-forecasts") covers the v0.4.0 schema: how to read the Index vs YoY split, how to combine EFO with PFD outturn via the shared schema, and how to compare two vintages. The existing vignette("vintages") is updated for the renamed period column.

obr 0.3.0

New: provenance metadata on every returned object

  • All data-returning functions now return an obr_tbl object: a data.frame with attached provenance recording the source URL, OBR publication code (“PFD”, “HFD”, “EFO”, “WTR”, “FSR”), publication vintage (e.g. “March 2026”), retrieval timestamp, file MD5 fingerprint, and obr package version. This lets users audit which OBR publication produced any number, and reproduce analyses across new package or OBR releases.
  • Print method shows a provenance header before the data.
  • summary() returns the full provenance card.
  • New helper obr_provenance() extracts the metadata as a list.
  • Subsetting with [ preserves the class and attributes; as.data.frame() strips them.

New: vintage layer for reproducible analysis

  • obr_efo_vintages() returns a structured table of every EFO published since the OBR was created in June 2010, with publication dates and URL slugs.
  • obr_as_of(date) returns the EFO that was current on a given calendar date. Useful for reproducing analyses as they would have looked at a given point in time.
  • obr_pin(vintage) sets a session-wide EFO vintage that flows into get_efo_fiscal() and get_efo_economy(). obr_unpin() clears it and obr_pinned() returns the current pin.
  • get_efo_fiscal() and get_efo_economy() now accept a vintage = argument that overrides any pin and downloads the file for that specific EFO. Cached files are vintage-tagged so different vintages do not overwrite each other.

New: Policy Measures Database

  • get_policy_measures() provides programmatic access to the OBR’s Policy Measures Database, with one row per fiscal-event-scored measure since 1970 (tax) or 2010 (spending). Columns include the fiscal event, plain- English description, Treasury head, fiscal year, and Exchequer effect in GBP million.
  • Supports filters: type (“tax”, “spending”, or both), search (regex on description / head, case-insensitive), since (fiscal-year cut-off).
  • policy_measures_summary() aggregates the long format to net Exchequer effect by event and fiscal year.
  • This is the only programmatic access to the PMD: the OBR otherwise distributes it as a single Excel workbook with non-standard layout.

New: fiscal rules reference

  • obr_fiscal_rules() returns a structured table of the three numerical rules in the current Charter for Budget Responsibility (Autumn 2024, updated Autumn 2025): the stability rule (current budget surplus), the investment rule (PSNFL/GDP falling), and the welfare cap. The metric, pass direction, target-year mechanics, and source Charter / Act are shipped as data. Numerical headroom is not shipped as a constant because it changes at every fiscal event; users should derive it from current EFO output via [get_efo_fiscal()] or read the EFO press release.

New: Forecast Revisions Database and forecast panel

  • get_forecast_revisions() provides programmatic access to the OBR’s Forecast Revisions Database, which decomposes each EFO-to-EFO change in the headline PSNB forecast into policy, classifications and one-offs, and underlying (economic determinants) components. Available in both GBP billion and per cent of GDP.
  • obr_forecast_panel() pivots the long-format Historical Forecasts Database to a wide real-time panel: rows are forecast vintages, columns are fiscal years, cells are forecast values. Mirrors how the OBR’s own Forecast Evaluation Report lays out forecast performance and lets users read the h-step-ahead forecast for any vintage off the diagonal.

Breaking-ish changes

  • No public API was renamed or removed. All existing exports keep their signatures and return columns; the only difference is that returned frames now carry the obr_tbl class and provenance attributes.

URL resolution and reliability

  • The Historical Forecasts Database URL is now resolved dynamically across recent fiscal events (previously hardcoded to March 2025).
  • When dynamic URL resolution falls through to the hardcoded fallback for any publication (EFO, WTR, FSR, HFD), the package now emits an explicit cli::cli_warn() instead of failing silently. The returned data frame records source = "fallback" so callers can detect this state.
  • Excel sheet-name lookup now tolerates encoding changes via a regex fallback. Series whose primary sheet name uses a non-ASCII Pound symbol (PSNB, receipts, expenditure) fall back to a letter-only pattern if the literal name is missing.
  • obr_resolve_url() now uses HEAD requests for faster candidate probing and captures the redirect target so the Public Finances Databank vintage can be recovered from the stable slug.

Parser robustness

  • parse_efo_output_gap() (sheet 1.14) now scans for the value column with the most aligned numeric entries instead of hardcoding column 3.
  • parse_pension_projections() (FSR sheet C1.2) now detects sections via fuzzy matching on “demographic” and “triple lock” rather than exact strings.
  • Receipts column footnote stripping now only removes 1-2 trailing digits when preceded by a letter, period, or whitespace, so series legitimately ending in digits are not corrupted.

Documentation

  • Em-dashes removed from roxygen titles to avoid encoding issues on Windows.
  • match.arg() is now used for series and measure arguments.
  • inst/CITATION reads the version from DESCRIPTION so it stays in sync.

obr 0.2.5

CRAN release: 2026-04-14

  • EFO, Welfare Trends Report, and Fiscal Sustainability Report download URLs are now resolved dynamically, trying recent publication dates in reverse chronological order. This prevents functions from breaking when OBR publishes new editions. Hardcoded URLs are retained as fallbacks.

obr 0.2.4

CRAN release: 2026-03-17

  • Removed non-existent pkgdown URL from DESCRIPTION.

obr 0.2.3

  • Examples now cache to tempdir() instead of the user’s home directory, fixing CRAN policy compliance for \donttest examples.
  • Cache directory is now configurable via options(obr.cache_dir = ...).

obr 0.2.2

CRAN release: 2026-03-12

  • Fix README URLs flagged by CRAN incoming checks (301 redirects).
  • Add “Databank” to WORDLIST.

obr 0.2.1

  • Update WORDLIST with domain-specific terms (EFO, FSR, WTR, CPIH, etc.)

obr 0.2.0

New datasets

Economic and Fiscal Outlook (EFO)

  • get_efo_fiscal() for five-year fiscal projections (net borrowing components) from the latest Budget
  • get_efo_economy(measure) for quarterly economic projections: "inflation" (CPI, CPIH, RPI, RPIX), "labour" (employment, unemployment, participation), or "output_gap"
  • list_efo_economy_measures() lists available economy measures
  • get_welfare_spending() returns working-age welfare spending split by incapacity and non-incapacity (% of GDP, from 1978-79)
  • get_incapacity_spending() returns incapacity benefits spending by benefit type (ESA, IB, Invalidity Benefit, Sickness Benefit, SDA) as % of GDP
  • get_incapacity_caseloads() returns combined incapacity benefit caseloads and prevalence since 2008-09

Fiscal Risks and Sustainability Report (FSR)

  • get_pension_projections() returns 50-year state pension spending projections (% of GDP) under alternative demographic and triple-lock scenarios

obr 0.1.0