The Bank of England gets it wrong again

On its own logic, model and data the Bank should have kept rates at 5.25%. The CPi they say is about to go up again from a brief encounter with its 2% target. It has fallen thanks to world prices, not thanks to domestic inflation. Energy prices will go up again.

Services inflation and wages came in higher at  5.7% and 5.6% implying more inflation above 2% to come. There was no mention of the consequences of the big inflation busting pay awards for the public sector which is a new inflationary force let loose. The Bank knew all about it as they say they were briefed by the government. There was no analysis of the lack of funding so far identified to pay  for most of the planned multi billion  increase in spending  announced by the new government. Surely this is also a concern?
The MPC  failed to consider the impact of its damaging losses on bond sales, putting this off til their next meeting so they can carry on claiming huge taxpayer bail outs.

If the Bank believed inflation is a monetary phenomenon they could have made a case for easing. It would be best to do that by throttling back the bond sales they call QT. They are having to set up a generous reverse repo facility to deal with possible lack of money in the system brought on by QT. As they do not so believe they should be alarmed by the continued elevated level of pay growth unmatched by productivity and the way in which a big unfunded public sector pay rise could force more in the private sector to match the inflationary increases.

The MPC  was split 5-4. The minority saw the illogicality of the majority and argued more the case I have set out above. The minority too ignored the QT bond sales and the liquidity squeeze in their minuted remarks.

 

 

62 Comments

  1. Andrew Jones
    August 2, 2024

    Mr Bailey apparently voted to reduce. A pipsqueak of a reduction in reality which won’t get passed on in lending rates but will undoubtedly be quickly snatched from savers. As in the long running US saga it smacks of doubt in their own actions.

    As you say big questions about the wage inflation reality of these proposed Public Sector rises which the BOE was aware of.

    Just how is it we mine such rare earth leaders in this country?

    1. Ian wragg
      August 2, 2024

      The socialist BoE had its friends in government now so don’t expect any sensible decisions. Gideon appointed Bailey who along with most of the Quangos has no relevant qualifications, he was a disaster in his last job.
      Good to see Keith blaming all the unrest on the Far Right which doesn’t include Harehills or the weekly disgrace in Khans stabistan.
      Trouble is brewing.

      1. Everhopeful
        August 2, 2024

        I reckon they are trying to cloak Labour in a “feel good factor”
just “working people” you understand
not pensioners or right wing voters.
        As to the Far Right ( and who
WHAT is that pray?) 
the idea that they are the main/worst problem has been brewing for a while. The Mayor cited the EDL some time back and they do not exist any more! Referred to again now re the riots
like protest is worse than three little girls being murdered! But I imagine that this is a push to force things ever leftwards so that like in Germany even political parties can come under threat.
        As has been said for a long time
our Uniparty government is officially at war with the people.

        1. Hope
          August 2, 2024

          Starmer clearly dishonest in his govt. of service bile rant again. He tried to overturn Brexit undermining democracy and national vote. He supported Corbyn to be PM when his party found by ECHR to be anti semetic. How about his kneeling for BLM with the deputy creature Rayner? I presume he knows what BLM stand for, their marches not condoned or condemned by him. Why no questions from MSM? Starmer cancelling Rwanda or any plan to stop mass illegal immigration, is that in service for UK when every poll shows public want it stopped? It costs about ÂŁ6 billion a year Reeves was not open or honest about that in her black hole!

          How about pro Gaza violent protests in London, they now have 4 MPs? Has he done anything about the MPs?

          New unit for police to show something being done! Idiot. What happened in 1984 during minor strikes? Police pretty mobile then. How about the riots? Mutual aid for policing has been around for years, it is an excuse for more authoritative legislation to force silence and stop protest unless it is one Starmer agrees with.

          1. Everhopeful
            August 2, 2024

            Elite’s utopian plan must be protected at all costs. Thus protest re immigration is a greater crime than child murder.
            Yes. I am sure they welcome protest ( which after all they have stoked up) as a means of imposing totalitarian regime and communism.
            I was thinking about 1984 because the police are acting similarly now. Why was it so desperately important to bring the miners to heel? Was it anti commie ( unions) or pro globalist beginnings of anti fossil fuel?

          2. Hope
            August 2, 2024

            Former US ambassador Woody ? says Trump will remember the Foreign Secretary previously called President Trump a “neo-Nazi sympathizing sociopath”.

            Is this what Starmer thinks a Govt. of service to All looks like before he made Lammy Foreign Secretary? Is it even statesman like? Is this not far left hate crime?

      2. Lifelogic
        August 2, 2024

        Carney first. Both Bailey and Carney were/are total disasters History and PPE graduates and deluded woke climate alarmists too.

        1. Hope
          August 2, 2024

          Reported today in Guido Deputy Creature Rayner has cut back on housing targets, Reeves stopping infrastructure projects and Starmer cancelled IT tech start ups. I thought they were for growth?

          Do they mean illegal immigration growth, immigration growth, criminals let of prison into society growth, tax growth, EU growth, foreign aide growth, debt growth, brain drain growth?

        2. Hope
          August 2, 2024

          BOE quietly admits it was mainly responsible for crash when Truss was in office! It held 60% of world LDIs! Now there is an admission why has Bailey not been sacked, members changed or sacked and authority given back to Treasury/Govt, namely the ones we elect? Scrap ONS and OBR because we have a treasury! The BoE has not got it wrong again, the govt. fails to take back control!

      3. Hope
        August 2, 2024

        When Rayner called conservatives scum, why did Starmer think it okay to appoint her deputy PM? Is this not far left hate crime? Does he think this is conducive to serve All people with his govt of service? What an insincere liar.

    2. Peter
      August 2, 2024

      Stock markets crashing around the globe triggered by poor results from US tech companies.

      Meanwhile, political violence as predicted – but earlier than I expected. Starmer tries to focus on the symptoms while ignoring the cause.

      His tough talk will count for nothing. Protests will grow and protesters will gain experience to counter police measures.

      Infiltration will fail as small groups operate outside the better known organisations. They will reek havoc outside the ‘kettle’.

      1. Peter
        August 2, 2024

        Wreak not reek!

  2. agricola
    August 2, 2024

    Could it possibly be that the MPC is far more left leaning politically than they are supposed to be and wished to send a welcome signal to Rachael Reeves and the government.
    I for one suspected their motives when as part of the blob they piled in behind the illegal undemocratic coupe to oust Liz Truss and her government.
    I further suspect that control of all our institutions has been hijacked by the left to fulfill left outcomes irrespective of the political shade of government. This suspicion covers all quangos, the police, the judiciary and even the military. So should Reform emerge as a government in the future they must conduct a comprehensive reset of the relationship between government and the institutions.
    It was the Blair period in politics that set this up to hamstring any incoming goverment that was not new labour. We are now into a period of political instability and protest until the theft of democracy is restored.

    1. Donna
      August 2, 2024

      +1
      The Long March through the institutions has delivered an institutionally left-wing Establishment/State.

      It will take someone far braver and more committed than the 6 empty suits standing for the Not-a-Conservative-Party Leadership to dismantle it.

      1. Hope
        August 2, 2024

        It is clear Bailey is unfit for office and should not be paid over ÂŁ600,000. Anyone losing billions for the taxpayer to pick up, as JR repeatedly points out, should be sacked.

        I think it is most members simply do not fully understand what they are doing. Whatever they must do should be left wing globalist WEF group think?

  3. Roy Grainger
    August 2, 2024

    Yes I was surprised they reduced the rate, I was sure Bailey wouldn’t move until the Fed did to give him cover. I can only assume that enough of the MPC are so elated with a Labour victory they wanted to give them a present. I wonder if the next move in rates will be upwards ?

  4. DOM
    August 2, 2024

    Bailey sees repairing the balance sheet of the BoE as his most important objective. All else is subordinate to this . If that means more active QT and elevated levels short term liquidity management using the Repo facility in which gilts are trading in and out of the balance sheet overnight then that’s what he’s going to do. Interest rate levels become secondary to this process.

    We’ve had the QE splurge on two occasions, 2008 (financial system collapse) and 2020 (the totally unnecessary Covid spree instigated by the idiot Johnson). We’re now paying the price for lax monetary policy with higher rates over an elongated time frame

    Labour’s public sector parasitism has only just started. That in itself will drive inflation. Labour know this and so does Bailey. He’s merely preparing for a more uncertain future now we have a proper extremist party in government

    There’s no such thing as a free-lunch, we all know this. There’s a cost to be borne for actually living, breathing and existing.

    1. Everhopeful
      August 2, 2024

      Agree entirely.
      What puzzles me..having lived through several “austere” seeming times
is why this time there is no cheap food. No cheap alternatives. ( And even if cheap cuts were available fuel is expensive).
      What exactly has the regime ( global or what?) done to bring this about?
      Is it regulation? Destruction of farming? Shipping scams?
      They want us to believe it is Brexit?
      They’ve ( I know) shut down many small shops.
      The prices are just about doubling over night
and no cheap alternatives especially pet food.
      Surely we will find starved as well as frozen folk marooned in their homes?

      1. Mickey Taking
        August 2, 2024

        ..small steps towards life as in Russia, outside of the favoured living in major cities and the boss prefers apparatchiks to anyone with a glimmer of independent thought.

        1. Everhopeful
          August 2, 2024

          And the boss gets all the best cuts of meat that just aren’t available to the prolls?

    2. Lifelogic
      August 2, 2024

      Johnson plus let’s create 12% inflation and nearly double public debt with QE, lockdowns & vast waste Sunak. Then I can blame it all on Truss, become leader and claim the credit as PM for lowering it back to 2% again. Plus I will lie to the house about the Covid Vaccines being “unequivocally safe” when the stats and all the evidence say the total reverse. Has Sunak corrected the record yet? Is he even intending to? The facts are all coming out and are very clear indeed. They should never have been allowed and certainly for thr young and those who had had Covid.

  5. Donna
    August 2, 2024

    There’s a Labour Government to support; an interest-rate cut had been predicted for some time and the B of E has duly delivered for its preferred branch of the Westminster Uni-Party.

    We’re not going to get competence until the senior personnel at the B of E / MCP are changed.

    But since the people currently there suit the IMF / WEF and their puppets in Government, that won’t happen any time soon.

    1. glen cullen
      August 2, 2024

      
.and don’t forget the BoE ‘ESG’ saga which continues at pace

  6. Paul Freedman
    August 2, 2024

    I believe it was far too premature to cut rates too. Core CPI is 3.5% and that is still significantly above its historical trend; the economy is improving well and the resulting aggregate demand, coupled with the likelihood of more prospective 0.25% rate cuts, is a recipe for spurring inflation. How can the BoE expect to get inflation under control with this backdrop? I think the problem is half of the MPC recognise this but were slightly outnumbered by the other half who believe aggregate demand will wane prospectively resulting in slack in the economy. There is no credible evidence of the latter and so it is an assumption and an unlikely one too. It is absurd to cut rates when inflation is still not fully under control yet.

  7. Richard1
    August 2, 2024

    I imagine all those MPC members are broadly sympathetic to Labour as they hear generally leftwing and Keynesian rhetoric from the Labour ministers and there are hints at the reversal of Brexit. So probably the main driver is political – to give Labour a helping hand.

  8. Clough
    August 2, 2024

    They had to start reducing the bank rate. Otherwise it would remain very difficult for enough people to get mortgages, to buy the thousands more new houses the government wants built every year. As others have already commented, this was a political decision, and as SJR points out, it was not driven by any economic logic.

    One of the very few advantages of a Labour government is that things get quite a lot clearer about the way we are governed. The brutal reality may not be nice to look at, but at least we can see it for what it is.

  9. formula57
    August 2, 2024

    This too early rate move likely reduces scope for further cuts, so mitigating the harm arising.

    A key question is whether or not the U.S.A. is now in recession. Many statistical indicators show discouraging trends.

    (Why have Sunak and Hunt not trumpeted this rate cut as evidence of their astute stewardship? It is not, of course, but such consideration has not stopped them hitherto. Is the art of Opposition as beyond them as was the art of Government?)

  10. formula57
    August 2, 2024

    Does the MPC still struggle on with its pre-Bernanke review discredited models perhaps?

  11. ferdi
    August 2, 2024

    You know far more than I do about bond markets but is has seemed for a while that 2% inflation is a false indicator. Inflation will surely start rising again soon as it has already in the Eurozone.

  12. Sakara Gold
    August 2, 2024

    At the Bitcoin 2024 Conference in America on Saturday, Senator Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) announced that she planned to introduce a new bill aimed at creating a national Bitcoin reserve. Bitcoin is a “digital currency” which is conjured somewhere out of the Cloud, inexplicably worth $65,270.55 each last night

    The national debt of the USA topped $35 TRILLION in July. This amount of debt is so huge that there is no hope of it ever being paid down. Inevitably, the value of the $US against stronger currencies will weaken. A lot of criminal activity is associated with Bitcoin and the US Taxpayer’s money would be better spent buying gold on the open market.

    It is possible to heft a one ounce Krugerrand in the hand and feel its value. You can’t do that with a Bitcoin

  13. Everhopeful
    August 2, 2024

    I am SO glad that JR has a pessimistic view of Labour’s economic ditherings
    He is always, always correct on such things.
    That means Labour is heading for the usual slurry of fiscal horror.
    I hope they really do screw up big time.
    The pain will be worth it.

    1. Mickey Taking
      August 2, 2024

      only if we finally get real Conservatives back!
      Nothing shows much sign unless more millions throw their hat in the Reform ring, eh? Sir John.

      1. Everhopeful
        August 2, 2024

        We don’t really know whether Reform will actually do very much.
        We don’t know how Labour will try to destroy/outlaw them!
        Ifs and buts

        However, as for hopes
I hope Labour will make itself even more unpopular than it already is!

  14. Lifelogic
    August 2, 2024

    The main thing driving up energy prices is Ed Miliband’s moronic Net Zero agenda and war on fossil fuel extraction. Get drilling, mining & fracking and halve gas prices please.

    Meanwhile Starmer pours fuel on the fire of the demonstrations against his government (and the last) evil, two tier policing policy. His speech was totally misjudged it almost made me want to fly back to the UK to demonstrate.

    He complained about the demonstrations prejudicing any trial for the person accused of killing these young girls. But they directly after announced that the protestors many of whom were arrested were criminal thugs, violent disorder not protests he says constantly calling them far right. So no problem with prejudicing their trial. Blatant two tier Starmer and two tier policing. He want the police to clamp down very, very hard on the “far right” petrol on the fire mate. He also wants to further attack free speech.

    The law must be upheld everywhere he says but it is Starmer’s selective policing and fuel on the fire speech that is the min problem. Warning of ‘summer of riots’, as at least 15 protests planned this weekend it seems.

    Reply Lawful protests are different to riots. Lawful protests for whatever cause or of whatever political hue need fair and strong policing if they are in danger of shifting to illegal behaviour.

    1. Iago
      August 2, 2024

      It’s different from (ablative) and similar to (dative). It is bad enough being ruled by a far left, communist government lying about a “far right” and “managing’, their own word, the murders of the children. Did you not do O level Latin all those years ago?!

  15. Sakara Gold
    August 2, 2024

    The recent two for one prisoner swap between Russia and a number of NATO countries has been welcomed by the families of those involved

    Those freed include the US journalist, Evan Gershkovich; the UK-Russian opposition campaigner, Vladimir Kara-Murza; and the former US marine, Paul Whelan. Whelan, who holds quadruple nationality (US, Canada, UK and Irish) was serving 16 years for espionage. He had been passed over in previous swaps

    An optimistic interpretation of this exchange of prisoners might be to see a signal from Putin to the West that he is open to serious talks on the war in Ukraine. And a still more optimistic gloss would be that the US wants to send a similar signal back.

    Ukraine has sent and received a flurry of envoys in recent weeks that just could presage some movement in diplomacy that has been deadlocked for so long.

    1. R.Grange
      August 2, 2024

      Yes, Ukraine’s leaders know their time is up, and now they can only hold out for the best terms they can get from Russia. This war will end soon, and on Russia’s terms. And we’ve spent at least ÂŁ6bn on a futile exercise in a proxy war that’s just had the effect of greatly strengthening a country and its military that we’re supposed to regard as a major enemy. Woeful.

      1. Donna
        August 3, 2024

        +1
        Putin probably figures he’ll get a better deal from Senile Joe and his handlers than he will from President Trump. The Dems would love to claim they “negotiated a peace in Ukraine” …. and Zelensky will be quietly “retired” far away from the devastated rump of Ukraine.

  16. Everhopeful
    August 2, 2024

    Oh my goodness!!
    “The Church Times” is trying to make a case for the upper echelons of our new govt.
    being religious people!!
    Even the PM who though not actually believing in God, to the extent that he had to take a different oath, is sort of churchified by association!
    Well!
    Could there be a clearer indication/declaration of church politics?

  17. Everhopeful
    August 2, 2024

    If there were a “black hole”. (Why doesn’t Labour shy away in horror from such a description?)
    And It needs to be filled with winter fuel money

    Then surely when a certain number of pensioners begin claiming the pension credits they are entitled to but hitherto have not claimed
then the clawing back won’t have done much good!
    And won’t the clawing back admin cost something?
    Ditto when they begin means testing the old age pension.
    I bet that the interest rate cut is more about screwing right wing voters with savings than anything else.

    1. hefner
      August 2, 2024

      Fraser Nelson, The Spectator, 29/07/2024 ‘Politics/Reeves is right to cut the ‘winter fuel’ bung’.
      ‘A millionaire I know has a tradition every year: he buys a bottle of vintage wine with his Winter Fuel Payment and invites friends to drink it. His point is that it’s ludicrous that people like him are given handouts by the Government – and today finally Rachel Reeves is doing something about it by cutting it for those not on benefits’.

      Furthermore a third of people who could claim pension benefits don’t do it (gov.uk ‘Pension Credit: Eligibility).
      Then does EH knows how many pensioners would be eligible? and whether there are (or not) enough staff at DWP to deal with the additional demanders? how much would that cost (if anything)?

      Then again, has the present Government stated their intention to means testing ‘the old age pension’? (and BTW what is that?)

      Finally does EH thinks that ‘right wing voters’ are unable to have put their additional cash into, say, a one-year bond, which till today could bring a 5% interest rate?

      1. Everhopeful
        August 2, 2024

        Presumably hefner voted Labour?
        Let’s hope he enjoys the ride!

  18. Ian B
    August 2, 2024

    “big inflation busting pay awards for the public sector which is a new inflationary force let loose” did under the new regime, the OBR do a full assessment as is now required? Or is that just an requirement if you are Conservative?

    Commons Library Briefing, 2 December 2020 – In June 2020 there were 5.5 million public sector workers in the UK, representing 16.7% of all people in employment.
    5.5% pay rise with inflation at 2%, only came into being when Labour gained office. ÂŁ8.3 billion of funding for Great British Energy. Labour will honour a pledge of ÂŁ11.6bn in overseas aid for the climate crisis, the energy secretary, Ed Miliband. – Is any one counting? Is the OBR issuing a full public report as is now required?

    The Conservatives left a black hole, they didn’t account for the instant massive prolific spending Labour would introduce.

    Labour will of course get away with there is no Conservative Party. No Conservative opposition. There is only systems in place to install another Socialist Party in opposition

    Reply We have just had an expensive mini budget with a Vat rise and plenty of spending increases but no OBR forecast. I have pointed this out but mainstream media as always not running that obvious breaking of a promise.

    1. Ian B
      August 2, 2024

      @Reply – understood, appologies

  19. Ian B
    August 2, 2024

    Sir John
    ‘The Bank of England gets it wrong again’ are you sure, wasn’t that the plan? It has for some time appeared as if what some of us call the WEF Socialists had high-jacked the BoE and the OBR, and now has a member of the inner circle Starmer in power in the UK.
    [ named rich people Ed) all sponsors of World Socialism in their image, there are the promoters of ESG –Environmental, Social and Governance, and many more disruptive campaigns. Starmer has announced in public his trust in them over a democratically elected Parliament, implying he will serve them before the UK.
    So would you think the BoE’s support and manipulation of the political landscape of the UK would be unquestioned.

    1. glen cullen
      August 2, 2024

      Agree – its a bit like our immigration policy, tell the voting people ‘no-more’ but tell the EU & France ‘more-the-merrier’

  20. Original Richard
    August 2, 2024

    If the BoE’s actions appear wrong it’s because the BoE’s task is not to keep inflation low or to promote economic activity or to protect or improve the standard of living or the wealth of the country or its citizens.

    It is to deliver Net Zero, a policy started by the former Governor, Mark Carney who is now chairing Brookfield Asset Management and the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero.

    We have to remember that PM Johnson informed us that we must “Build Back Better” which has to start with economic destruction, aka his Net Zero Strategy, and PM Sunak, when Chancellor at COP26 declared “So our third action is to rewire the entire global financial system for Net Zero.”

    It’s likely that a cut in interest rates had something to do with the upcoming renewables CfD auction taking place next month.

  21. Bryan Harris
    August 2, 2024

    There must come a point, surely, when we all come to realise that the Bank is working to another agenda other than the one they are supposed to be following.
    What is that new agenda?
    Well, it aligns with the OBR agenda, and certainly aligns well with a new labour government that intends to make our lives all the more uncomfortable and impoverished. Never mind the threat of ever more taxation, Starmer now wants to fully exploit facial recognition surveillance to be able to prosecute more easily those that protest his policies.
    The Bank has been getting it wrong for too long now, but the question nobody is asking is; “JUST WHERE WILL THE ACTIONS OF THE BANK AND OTHER INSTITUTIONS TAKE US – WHAT IS THE END GAME?”

  22. Ian B
    August 2, 2024

    The ‘far right’ is the name given to centre ground Conservatives by Starmer, Labour and the Conservative party leadership of the ‘One Nation’ Socialists faction. Today it has emerged that Starmer has placed the blame for the Southport Riots on these same people.

    The greater majority of the UK want to be self-reliant; they try to be self-reliant and resilient – the centre ground, people of a conservative nature. They look in the mirror and see the person that is responsible for their life, so work hard to provide for themselves and families, they are the true conservatives.

    So having the Politicos, the supporters of World Socialism referring to them then in derogatory terms as being ‘far right’, is insulting.

    The name calling is ridiculous, all that is needed is for our political class to represent and serve those that elected them. Once they themselves start seeing a higher authority than those that elected them as their lord and master, they have lost the trust of those they serve.

  23. Bert+Young
    August 2, 2024

    Reeves and Bailey are hand in glove ; both should resign and leave the Pensioners alone .

  24. Tom Frazer
    August 2, 2024

    When the bank continually goes against its own policies, it cannot be said to be acting in the public interest.
    I think back to when Mark Carney removed the minimum capital buffer after the Brexit vote. It was supposed to be an extreme measure to boost the economy after recession when there was very low risk of relapse. This was what their own policy stated at the time. Fortunately no one wanted to borrow money at that precise moment anyway. What can we do about it? I have had a problem with them for years and I’m only 29!

  25. ChrisS
    August 2, 2024

    I agree that a rate cut was all but inevitable as a signal that the MPC thoroughly approved of the change of government and it was in effect a slap in the face for Sunak. There would be no argument from the OBR or the Civil Servants at the Treasury. either.

    I happen to believe that an early rate cut was the right thing to do. There are many people with mortgages that need some relief and although a 25 point reduction isn’t much, it is a start. If it contributes to putting inflation up by a tiny bit later on, that won’t matter : it isn’t going to hit the dizzy heights we saw during the Sunak regime.

    Much worse is to come when Reeves really gets going. I cannot see how interest rates are going to go anywhere but up in the next four years as Labour is already overspending. Everything they have announced so far is going to increase public spending, and not by a little.

    They have indicated how they are going to govern with their idiotic public sector pay settlements, especially the NHS ones which, like Gordon Brown’s even more generous settlements, are not even going to be offset by an insistence on efficiency savings. Wes Streeting is the only minister in this government who gave one any hope for the future, but Reeves has just made his task much more difficult. Against his better judgement, she is going to force Streeting into asking for even more money over the life of this government.

  26. paul
    August 2, 2024

    I dont think it matters much with unemployment going up from 3.4% to 4.4% now and rising as months go by, with the world moving into a recession.

    Labour will do all the wrong things and turn it into a depression that will last for their whole five years and beyond, the plebs never learn and I say let them have it full on.

  27. Keith from Leeds
    August 2, 2024

    It is a political rate cut now Labour is the Government. The problem lies with Sunak and Hunt, who should have sacked Bailey when inflation soared. If there is no penalty for failure that is what you will get constantly.
    Likewise, the riots we are seeing are the tip of the iceberg. Having promised to reduce Immigration in 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019, the Conservative Government did nothing to stop the flow. The media gleefully deploys the “far right” label, but many ordinary people are fed up with UK values and culture being denigrated.
    MPs on all sides of the house let in millions but did nothing about building houses, reservoirs, hospitals, and schools, training more GPs and Nurses, or providing needed infrastructure. Their conduct over the last 24 years is a disgrace!

  28. glen cullen
    August 2, 2024

    ”The government(s) keep allowing the BoE to get it wrong”
    I’ve corrected the line

  29. Barbara
    August 2, 2024

    Icymi, the BoE has now very quietly admitted it was they, not Truss, who crashed the economy
    https://x.com/trussliz/status/1818532637977272764

    1. Lifelogic
      August 2, 2024

      Well the BoE and the total mess left by Sunak as Chancellor the vast increase in public debt, QE, the vast waste on HS2, Covid Loans, Test and Trace, net harm vaccines, the net harm lockdowns…

    2. Ian B
      August 2, 2024

      @Barbara +1 – so very true. The other panic liability-driven investment (LDI) that are said to behind the crash, they were identified many years ago as a bit of a basket case, the FCA was to plug that hole and didn’t, the man in charge at the time? guess. As you say very quietly their own investigation puts a different complexion on the situation

    3. glen cullen
      August 2, 2024

      Could we have Liz back then ….no because all the tory MPs are now left & woke …as the new leader will be

  30. Ukretired123
    August 2, 2024

    The Labour party have inherited a fortunate economic position as SJR indicated and are desperate to paint a bleaker black hole aided by their elevation of the OBR and BOE to a joint Holy Cow status despite their appalling track records failings in recent years damaging the economy.
    Spinning nonsense whilst farming out their govt responsibilities to Labour’s quangos further entrench their powers.
    Awarding Public Sector workers inflation busting pay rises is blatant bribery to vote Labour, esp when Starmer would not answer how he would solve this problem before the GE.
    Today he blames the far right for riots (which are appalling) but remember senior Labour MP Peter Mandelson famous for “rubbing their noses in it” encouraging mass immigration for client voters decades ago. As you sow, now Labour’s new quandary.

  31. paul
    August 2, 2024

    Look like yanks are starting their recession with unemployment going from 3.4% to 4.3 % now with every esle going the wrong way as well

  32. Everhopeful
    August 2, 2024

    My comments/replies keep disappearing!

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