In this episode of V-FM Pensions Nico and Darren (slightly croaky and end-of-year tired) chat glow-in-the-dark dog walks, North London derby emotions and the Pensions Expert Annual Conference at Pennyhill Park… before diving head-first into the Budget and the chaos that surrounded it.

We unpack Darren’s recent comment piece in Pensions Expert, the OBR leak that turned out to be more cock-up than conspiracy, and why pre-Budget “kite flying” left real people scrambling over tax-free cash decisions. From ISA tweaks to salary sacrifice caps and frozen tax thresholds, we ask what any of this says about trust, growth and whether the government actually has a story to tell.

We also loop back to interviews with three of our World Pensions Summit guests (Tina Fordham, Amlan Roy and Sonja Laud) and link the Budget madness to the bigger themes of volatility, broken forecasting and the end of the “great moderation”.