Exchequer is a department in the Treasury of the United Kingdom. It collects, manages, and spends government funds. The department is controlled by the Treasury Board, which is composed of the prime minister (called the first lord of the treasury), the chancellor of the exchequer, and five junior lords. The chancellor is the minister of finance, and is always a Cabinet member. The chancellor prepares the annual budget. The budget contains proposed government expenditures and a program for raising money to meet these expenditures. The term exchequer comes from the old French word eschequier, meaning chessboard. It refers to the medieval custom of calculating revenue accounts on a checkered table.
