Recommendation 20

Under IFRS, the Treasury uses a real (inflation-adjusted) discount rate to value long-term obligations such as provisions and pensions. While appropriate under accounting rules, this means annual movements in liabilities can reflect economic shifts rather than changes in policy or risk. To aid transparency and comparability between years, we have previously urged HM Treasury to publish both discounted and undiscounted values for all major long-term liabilities.38 HM Treasury produced discounted and undiscounted values only for the nuclear decommissioning provision in 2023–24.39