Recommendation 19

Economic factors such as inflation and exchange rates will cause significant risks to the plan’s affordability. The Department told us that it has £25 billion of risks that are not included in its forecast costs because it deems these unlikely to occur, compared to £13 billion of more-likely risks that it does include in project cost forecasts.51 It will only take a relatively small change to significantly affect affordability, given that the Department currently has only a £2.6 billion surplus on the Plan and £4.3 billion of equipment contingency over 10 years.52