The Financial Times now asks Reeves about the possibility of US tariffs and how "damaging" a "full scale global trade war" would be for the UK.

The chancellor says the OBR today set out some different scenarios - adding that everyone was "very pleased" when the prime minister went to Washington recently for initial meetings.

Referring to Trump's previous term, Reeves says trade and investment flows between the UK and the US "increased".

"We'll continue to make the case for free and open trade."

Rachel Reeves is then asked by Bloomberg about IFS comments that the government's headroom is limited, meaning taxes may need to be increased in future - as our business reporter explains.

Reeves responds that she inherited the lowest headroom a chancellor has ever been faced with.

She says that she managed to increase this headroom by around 50% in Autumn last year.

Since then, higher government borrowing costs have eroded much of that progress. But Reeves adds that today she has restored this headroom in full.

The chancellor says this proves people should have no doubt about her commitment to the fiscal rules and the need for stability.

Reeves is asked by a journalist from The Sun if the National Insurance increase (she announced in October) is actually a tax on working people.

Reeves replies that wages are rising at twice the rate of inflation. The national living wage is going up and inflation is coming down, Reeves says. People are starting to see extra money in their pay packets and living standards are going up, she claims.

The next question is from the ITV, who asks the chancellor whether her fiscal plans and self-imposed rules are punishing the most vulnerable.

In response, the chancellor says there is "nothing progressive and nothing Labour" about losing control of the public finances - which she says is what the previous Tory government did.

Markets impose discipline, Reeves adds, saying it's important to provide an anchor.

Reeves says today the government is spending £105bn per year on debt interest costs - which is more than the government spends on defence, the ministry of justice and the home office combined.

"This government wants to reduce debt, and reduce the deficit," she adds.

The BBC's Economics editor Faisal Islam about the OBR's assessment that many will be pushed into poverty as a result of the welfare cuts.

Reeves responds that the OBR set out that they haven't accounted for those who currently receive benefits but who will go into work.

Faisal then asks second question on speculation that the Digital Services Tax could be abolished and could she justify a "tax giveaway" for the biggest tech multinationals.

The chancellor says the Digital Service Tax was supposed to be temporary until there was a global agreement.

She underlines that the government believes companies should pay tax in the countries they operate - and the views on that "have not changed".

Rachel Reeves begins by setting out the government's mission and touts some of its achievements, including increasing breakfast club numbers and raising the minimum wage.

She observes, though, that global instability is hampering growth across the world, and admits that the cost of living crisis is "still very real" in the UK.

In this climate, Reeves notes that the country needs to spend more on defence, and repeats her refrain that Labour is "going further and faster" on this.

The chancellor's statement is only brief, as she reiterates some of the figures behind the government's new measures - such as plans to build 1.5 million new homes - which she set out earlier on today.

We'll bring you key lines from the chancellor's news conference very shortly - stay tuned.

You can follow along by clicking watch live at the top of the page.

Reeves's room for manoeuvre is minisculepublished at 16:28 Greenwich Mean Time 26 March

16:28 GMT 26 March

Dearbail Jordan
Business reporter

One of the most important points in today's Spring Statement is that the chancellor has restored the government's £9.9bn headroom.

This is basically spare cash the government is forecast to have in its annual budget in five years' time, taking into account its tax and spending plans.

It might sound like a lot but, as the OBR points out, that £9.9bn buffer is actually "a very small margin", especially considering that the official forecaster expects tax revenues and spending to reach £1.5 trillion each over the period to 2029-30.

The OBR reckons that Reeves has just over a 50% chance of meeting her own borrowing and debt rules by the end of the decade.

Compared to other chancellors since 2010, especially the likes of George Osborne, Reeves' room for manoeuvre is miniscule.

Just the merest puff of a headwind - such as Donald Trump's tariffs sparking a global trade war or higher borrowing costs - could knock the government's finances off course.

It means attention will now turn to the Budget and whether tax rises are on the horizon.

Kevin Peachey
Cost of living correspondent

It appears the chancellor's news conference is slightly delayed - we'll update you as soon as we have a clearer idea on timings.

While we wait, here's a look at how the Spring Statement could affect you:

1. Benefit changes

If you are on benefits, you could be directly affected.

The sweeping changes to the benefits system, first announced a week ago, will see some people lose support from late 2026, although universal credit payments are set to rise.

2. Living standards and household bills

No major government statements come in isolation and increases in water bills, energy prices, council tax and more will kick in on 1 April.

However, overall living standards, measured by real household disposable income, are expected to improve.

Remember, these are only forecasts. They may be wrong and are subject to change.

3. Jobs and services cut or created

Jobs could be affected and, for example, any cuts to local government funding could have a direct impact on services. Theoretically, that could lead, for example, to councils considering what to charge for local services.

On the flipside, investment by the government - such as with defence projects - could create new jobs.

• Our cost of living correspondent, Kevin Peachey, looks in detail into what the Spring Statement means for you

Image source, EPA

We're about to hear from Rachel Reeves for the second time today.

She's due to address a news conference in Downing Street after her Spring Statement earlier.

When she speaks, we'll bring you all the key lines right here. You can follow along yourself by clicking watch live at the top of the page.

Earlier the chancellor and OBR confirmed the government is on course to have around £10bn worth of headroom - in short, leeway to spend more or cut taxes - by the end of the decade.

Rachel Reeves billed that as a successful outcome of her policies. But Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) - an economics think tank - said it is a "tiny, tiny" amount of wiggle room.

He tells the BBC that any small negative change in the economic outlook could "require some action" and politicians and analysts alike may "spend the next six months speculating about tax rises".

Johnson says there is "an incredible degree of fiscal fine-tuning going on" in the chancellor's plans.

He says the government has "ended up with precisely the same numbers for headroom and borrowing for 2029/30 as they had at the beginning".

Changes to the economic picture, especially the rising cost of borrowing money, led to the Treasury being forecast to have £14bn less than they had previously expected to have by the general election.

Johnson says the chancellor "made up every penny to the one decimal place" in this Spring Statement.

Image source, IFS

Reform's deputy leader Richard Tice has been speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live outside the Palace of Westminster.

He is strongly critical of the independent OBR, describing their forecast as "delusional".

"We can’t keep spending more than we’re earning," he tells Matt Chorley. "I’m afraid we’re heading to a very difficult place, led by the R-word – recession."

Tice says voters didn't elect the OBR and that Labour shouldn't be relying so much on their advice.

• For context: The OBR is a body of independent experts that effectively marks the government's homework

Image source, UK Pool

Reacting to the Spring Statement, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch accuses the government of creating economic "chaos".

Badenoch says the statement "was all smoke and mirrors", and again calls it "an emergency budget".

The Tory leader says Reeves needed to deliver it "because of mess she made at the last budget", which took place last Autumn.

Image source, Getty Images

We can now bring you some reaction from the Liberal Democrats to the chancellor's Spring Statement.

"The slashing of growth is a hammer blow to the Chancellor’s economic credibility," Treasury spokesperson Daisy Cooper says.

She adds that the Labour government is "simply fiddling while Rome burns instead of fixing our trading relationship with Europe".

Cooper says Reeves must "immediately launch negotiations for a new UK-EU customs union," which she says will "kickstart growth, boost small businesses, and secure the vital revenue that our public services desperately need".

We've encountered a whirlwind of figures - and a variety of opinions on those figures - during and after Chancellor Rachel Reeves' Spring Statement today.

So here's our political correspondent Henry Zeffman with a tight summary of what it all means:

Back at the OBR news conference, committee member Prof David Miles addresses a question about whether tax rises for employers announced by Labour in October - which are due to come into effect on 1 April - have impacted its growth forecast.

He says the impact of those taxes was taken into account when the OBR produced its last set of forecasts in October. The tax changes are not "the main factor behind a pretty big downgrade for growth" this year, he adds.

Miles suggests interest rates in the UK and around the world, coupled with weakening consumer and business confidence, were the driving factors in the more pessimistic outlook for the year ahead.

With that, we're going to turn our attention away from the OBR briefing and return to bringing you more analysis and reaction to the day's events from elsewhere.

We're peeling away from the OBR news conference now to take a closer look at a bit more from its latest fiscal outlook, which was published as Rachel Reeves finished her Spring Statement in the Commons.

It's given the government a dressing-down for not providing details about plans to cut working-age welfare benefits until "very late in the process".

The forecaster also told the government off for "late notice of changes and incomplete analysis", which it said "hampered our ability to reflect these measures in our forecasts".

Labour announced last week that it wanted to reduce welfare spending by £5bn.

However, when the OBR subsequently checked the data behind the planned cuts, it found it fell £1.6bn short of the government's target. Cue much scrabbling around to find additional savings.

The government found them. The OBR now says welfare benefits will be cut by £4.8bn.

Dearbail Jordan
Business reporter

While the OBR no longer expects the economy to grow as quickly this year as they previously thought, things look relatively rosy after that.

In 2026, the OBR now reckons the economy will expand by 1.9% against its last forecast in October of 1.8%.

For 2027, the OBR forecasts 1.8% growth up from 1.5%, and the following year, it is expected to hit 1.7%, again up from October's outlook of 1.5%.

Those numbers look less optimistic when you consider the historical context: before the global financial crisis in 2008, the average annual growth rate was 2.7% according to the IFS.

Over at the OBR press conference, its experts have been reminding the room that the UK economy's "cruising speed" used to be around 2.5%. That feels like a long time ago now.

What does today mean for me? Could it affect my job or my finances?

As part of Your Voice, Your BBC News, our business and politics teams are on hand to answer your questions today. To get in touch:

• Email: bbcyourvoice@bbc.co.uk, external
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• Or fill out this form here

Image source, OBR

OBR chair Richard Hughes begins his post-statement briefing by talking through the latest forecasts.

As we've been reporting, the independent analysts revised their growth forecast for this year downwards, but said it would be higher than expected in each of the four years after that.

Hughes sets out the factors which have created a "particularly uncertain outlook for the UK and the global economy".

He says: "Both the global and domestic backdrop for this Spring Statement are more challenging than at the time of the previous forecast back in October."

The cost of government borrowing has risen for many countries, he adds, and there has been a "rebound of energy prices and inflation".