The Bank of Englandās way of fighting its inflationary mistakes of 2021 is to slow or stall the economy. They want to stop price rises by ensuring people cannot afford to buy so much, and to stop wage rises by increasing unemployment. This is all most unpleasant.
I have often pointed out it ignores two ways of sorting out inflation. The first is to avoid excessive money and credit growth It is true the Bank without saying so has now flipped from monetary excess to monetary tightness. The second is to promote more supply, which the Bank and government working together could and should do.
Yesterday the updated survey of UK business found that the average figure had fallen to 47.9 where 50 is the tipping point from no growth to growth. Services were at 48.7 and manufacturing at 43.3, so both sectors are now in retreat. This mirrored the Euro area whose Central Bank made the same mistakes in 2021. Their overall figure is 47, with services at 48.3 and manufacturing at 43.7.
Euro area interest rates have been held lower than ours and their Bank is not selling bonds off in the market at huge losses. When will the Bank of England get the message that it may now be lurching to too tough? It needs to get better at forecasting inflation Ā and to build a model which reflects the realities of the lag between raising rates and the impact on jobs and activity.
August 24, 2023
Good morning.
Did you not once say, Sir John that the Chancellor has to sign off on all the QE the BoE does ? If true, then why did the Chancellor refuse if the thought it would be inflationary ?
We have a Push-me-pull-you management of the economy, where everyone is going in different directions trying to meet their own targets, and failing.
It is time we brought the economy under one roof (Number 11) with independent economic advice replacing the thoroughly discredited OBR.
August 24, 2023
Mark, as ever, remember the Conservatives are no longer trying to solve our countryās problems, all they are doing is trying desperately to have you believe someone else is responsible for them (BoE, judges, EU, civil servants, woke lawyers, penniless people in boats)
August 24, 2023
ā My article for Conservative Home ā a more productive and less costly stateā dated 12 August never appeared on that site.
Meanwhile, a different article has appeared there –
ā John Redwood: Our public services are in poor shape. A new system of accountability is required.ā
Lots of comments over there. I still wonder what happened to the first article though.
August 24, 2023
Rex,
We had the blog about councils the other day.
This was Tory planning legislation (NPPF 2010 under Boles). Local authority grant reduced and replaced with NHB and CIL to force more house building.
Govt stated it would reduce immigration in 2019 look at actual govt numbers. Even these are estimates because the govt numbers are based on estimates of people coming and going! Why? To hide the true number. As a matter of national security in a host of issues the immigration figures should be accurate.
If I said to you build me a town with appropriate infrastructure but I am not going to tell you the numbers. Could you do it? That is the current and previous situation over 14 years of Tory mismanagement. Add covid and they appear surprised services cannot cope! They chose not to close the borders from international covid hotspots as well!
Tories stated many times to get elected they would balance the structural deficit. Look at figures from 2010 to date. How can any organisation plan on deliberate lies? Tory govt have lied over economy, immigration and Brexit. Who could plan anything based on anything any minister said? Seriously.
We have the pass the blame from JR to anyone and everyone. It no longer has any credibility.
August 24, 2023
Mark B
The WEF plan doesnāt allow for that
Their plan is for the UK to become a 3rd world sh.t h.le with mass immigration and to totally change the face of the country, they have now obtained their goal
The country is run by foreigners who have no allegiance to this country and boy does it show
Sorry Sir John!
August 24, 2023
Sorry, Sir John but this is off topic although it does cover issues raised here.
I have just finished watching the latest episode of, Auto Shenanigans on YT. It is about windfarms in Scotland and the trouble they had to go to to install them. If you can, please have a look. To give you a flavour, to install said wind turbines they had to cut down 160,000 trees.
ššššššš
August 24, 2023
Indeed other ways to cut inflation cut VAT and fuel duty, kill net zero, veto ULEZ, stop his vast government waste on HS2, the worthless degrees, cut red tape, reduce & deter migrants their legal aid and hotels, NHS cover ups, road blockingā¦ but he is all hot air and zero action.
August 24, 2023
I’d vote for you. I won’t be voting for the Not-a-Conservative-Party/WEF Puppets.
August 24, 2023
Have you ever watched ‘Yes, Prime Minister’? Seems to be how we are governed. Everything delayed, can kicked down the road. It is obvious the Tories have no clue and are just hanging, on doing nothing much, getting all they can out of it before they are kicked. out. Look at the slack business of the Commons in recent months. Then with a crisis on, they all hop off for 6 weeks break. This is apparently offered as a reason they can’t intervene on ULEZ and have a seemingly cozy bit of advice from tame lawyers that they can’t do it.
August 24, 2023
Whats the point in having the ‘law’ in the first place, if you rely upon lawyers who say you can’t use it
August 24, 2023
A perfect recipe for action, if only we had a Conservatoive government !
Unfortunately we haven’t, and Hunt has no vision of what a vibrant economy looks like. The jury is out on whether Sunak has any realisable vision.
It’s now a near certainty that Bailey will overdo interest rate rises and push us into recession. Recent figures would suggest a pause is in order, so that it can be seen whether recent action is working.
August 24, 2023
I didnāt know that we had a chancellor ā¦I thought weād subcontracted that function out to the BoE (ā¦and whoās this Hunt fellow ?)
August 24, 2023
What if their was a group of people whose sole aim it was to destroy this country. What if those people staged a coup and took over the government?
And then wrung out the last few shards of family silver for their swag bags.
Now that WOULD be rather unpleasant.
Especially if they decided to implement their long desired āNo Borderā policy.
And were allowed to succeed.
Obviously the first truly conservative budget since Mrs T would have scared the pants off them
So they would have had to ānip in quickā.
Hoping that they would not be caught.
August 24, 2023
***
What if there were ***
August 24, 2023
We wouldnāt notice any difference . . . ?
August 24, 2023
+++
Exactly š¤
August 24, 2023
A recession by any other name?
August 24, 2023
Nothing a few wind-turbines canāt solve
August 24, 2023
But surely. They must know what they are doing?
They know what happens when wages are taken home in wheelbarrows.
When you need a sack of high end notes to buy a loaf of bread.
August 24, 2023
“When you need a sack of high end notes to buy a loaf of bread”.
Ah, but what if, by then, such notes no longer exist?
August 24, 2023
The UK would be a better place if it did not have a bank that acted against the peopleās interest.
August 24, 2023
and a much better place if it did not have a government that acted against the people.
August 24, 2023
+++
Did they ever though?
Look after our gold and then turn it into worthless dead leaves?
( Meanwhile sell said gold).
Encourage folk into unrepayable debt.
Make them prove over and over who they are.
Limit how much of their own money they can access.
Refuse them money if their politics do not align with the bankās.
And then turn the worthless currency into ephemeral sparks darting through the air.
August 24, 2023
How do we vote the BOE out? What is the point of a democratically elected Government if it subcontracts the governing of the country to unsackable institutions?
August 24, 2023
BTW
I wasnāt saying that slavery no longer exists.
Just pointing out that the Abolition Acts came about, not through kindness, but through self interest. The same virtue signalling we see today.
August 24, 2023
A PPE graduate from a wealthy landed background and failed enterprise start ups on his CV. Hardly surprising we are getting no pushback from this miserable Chancellor. Cliches and sound bites, thatās all we get.
In the meantime his windfall tax has reduced exploration in the North Sea at the sane time as Sunak is trumpeting more lances, how does that work?
And his stopping tax free shopping is causing London/U.K. inc to lose out to the continent and corporation tax, companies to Ireland, hard working families brought into higher rare tax bands.
My goodness he must have a thick skin.
August 24, 2023
Certainly no intelligence NIGL!
August 24, 2023
“This is all most unpleasant.”
I think that’s your understatement of the year, Sir John.
Of course (just like the ULEZ scam) Sunak and Hunt COULD stop it – but are choosing not to. In the case of ULEZ, they’d rather play politics and let the “little people” suffer in the hope it will shore up the Conservative vote in the General Election. And in the case of the economy, what the IMF/WEF wants, the IMF/WEF gets ….. or otherwise their careers might be abruptly terminated, like their immediate predecessors were.
August 24, 2023
Indeed. Let that sink in. They could help the poorer people and workers but they choose not to do so. I read the link on here where Shapps was instructing TFL to extend the ULEZ scheme in order to receive funding. Please note the science says it makes next to nothing difference on health/pollution grounds so its all in line with their Net Zero religion. The legacies are useless. They have to go.
August 24, 2023
Our best hope is that the government will want to cut taxes before the general election in a desperate attempt to get reelected.
August 24, 2023
No. Our best hope is they’ll get serious and cut the state by half, its welfare for all with no time limits, mass immigration and its consequence’s for us all.
August 24, 2023
And if we vote them out anyway – does that mean we want higher taxes?
August 24, 2023
The BoE wants a recession and higher unemployment so they can blame Brexit. Anything other than admitting their mistakes.
August 24, 2023
Low interest rates have allowed zombie businesses to continue to exist for too long. Money must be priced realistically.
Restrict money creation by all means and increase supply but what rate would you have the bank set Sir John 5% seems like a reasonable price to borrow money unless you own a house that is 10 times you salary. That is a different policy issue.
August 24, 2023
Iām not really surprised re businesses.
What does anyone expect?
All the services are following ( Why? Who ordered it?) some bonkers online model.
It just does not work. Especially following our imprisonment which has left many mentally scarred.
They NEED the old, destroyed, never-to-return familiarity.
( And persistent rumours, even in mainstream, of another mass kidnap planned).
Special offers here, special offers there.
Who wants dental implants, wrinkle fillers BBQ specials or 100 bedding plants dead in the āpostā?
Desperate businesses tricked into deep trouble 3 years ago by the usual suspect. Our govt.
August 24, 2023
Same question as yesterday – why is the bank selling bonds at a loss instead of waiting until redemption? There must be a reason – what is it?
Reply Ask them. I disagree with the policy. They say they wish to reduce the size of their balance sheet but why? It is all guaranteed by taxpayers. I guess they do wish to drive mortgages rate even higher which you can do by selling bonds badly.
August 24, 2023
Thanks for the answer Sir John. How can we stop them?
August 24, 2023
to create a recession that paves the way for Europhile Labour to take this nation back into the EU.
Bailey’s a EU cuckoo in the nest, working indirectly with the EU and Labour
August 24, 2023
Reply to reply – this is a genuine question (as I donāt know the answer) – if I had, say, Ā£10 billions worth of gilts and decided I had to sell them at a loss for, say, Ā£6 billion, how would this affect the mortgage rate charged by, for example, Nationwide?
Also, as a veteran MP, arenāt you in a far better position than me to demand an explanation from Bailey? And from Hunt for allowing it.
Reply Selling gilts into an unwilling market lowers the price which raises the interest rate
August 24, 2023
August 24, 2023
It is reported that the ātotalā leaving package given to the leaving CEO of Natwest is over Ā£10m. Still the bank charge 39.9% on personal overdrafts, eight times base rate. So only 33,000 people with overdrafts of Ā£1,000 will easily cover it in a year. These also the tax payers who bailed Natwest out. This as they are being ripped of by at least 30% above a fair (and still profitable) rate of say 9.9% or just circa twice base rate. But clearly the FCA and Gov. like this total lack of real and fair competition and rip off banking. The Gov. also seem to like it in energy, transport, housing, education, the BBC broadcasting. This a bank that is still nearly half owned by the tax payers who bailed them out. Done (rather incompetently) by Labour and one Gordon Brown.
August 25, 2023
Defund the NatWest. Anyone who cares about the way this bank operates should close savings accounts s/he holds with them, and have their salary paid into another bank.
August 24, 2023
Allister Heath today:-
The eco-cultistsā hatred of people is propelling humanity to extinction
Plunging fertility rates are the crisis of the century, yet extremists cheer it in their narrow-minded crusade
August 24, 2023
I read that and when you put it with other articles coming from other sources… these globalists with their depopulation and equality (west drops to eastern levels) need to be stopped.
According to The People’s Voice – 14 US cities have signed treaties with the WEF to ban meat, dairy and private cars by 2030… and this includes some other ridiculous restrictions. They are signed up to C40 which our London mayor is signed up to. This should worry us all.
August 24, 2023
Why do you say that? In the last 75 years the global population has TRIPLED. Result? Alleged climate change and race to net zero. Plus mass immigration and emigration.
Surely rowing back a bit on the massive increase in population must be a good thing.
August 24, 2023
āThe Bank of Englandās way of fighting its inflationary mistakes of 2021 is to slow or stall the economyā – No they are just keeping their world in step with their superior beings in other Central Banks. The local boss, actually like that, as that makes them look compliant on what they see is the world stage.
The BoE and this Conservative Government are anti UK, why, were is the real driver to UKās wealth and prosperity ā the economy. It is sacrificed on personal self esteem and ego. We just need our MPās to serve the UK, we just need a real UK Conservative Party and Government.
Doubling debt in the time the pretend Conservative have been office is not growth, it is not the growth the UK can afford.
August 24, 2023
There is something very scary indeed when one opens a respected UK newspaper and reads a piece from a reactionary ex-labour journalist demanding that capital punishment be re-introduced.
Once again we read that “its only a few rotten apples in the barrel” and of course the public have nothing to fear if they have done nothing wrong.
Too bad if a lodge of incompetent, racist, misogynistic and corrupt police officers fit you up for something you haven’t done – and the judge believes them and sends you down for the long drop. No chance then of eventually being released when some “lefty journalists” take up your case as a miscarriage of justice, is there? That solves the dreadful problems we have with policing today, doesn’t it? Hang the innocent, so the buggers don’t get away with it…..
August 24, 2023
Hear, hear. State execution is appalling. Bloke released recently having done 18 years in prison for a crime he didnāt commit. To those that support state murder, you must live in a simple world where the justice system never makes a mistake.
August 24, 2023
Sir John
I am sure we all know the problems we face, but what is this Conservative Government, the Conservative Party going to do about them.
Its in their gift supported by a large majority in the HoC. It would appear that rather than getting on and āmanageā they play ālook at meā in the media or anywhere that plays to their ego. But knuckle down be an MP, be a Conservative, manage, no chance because it appears their Socialist WEF doctrine says fight the people, the people have to be brought to heal, so the āelitistsā can enjoy personal wealth from āthe great resetā
How else can you explain the continued daily incompetence and malicious damage?
August 24, 2023
Rather than relent is not the Bank is more likely to congratulate itself on a job well done, even if it stops short of a Lamontesque pronouncement of a price well worth paying?
As a saver I remain conscious that my returns remain below the rate of inflation, despite the Bank’s policy errors.
August 24, 2023
You ask when will the Bank of England etc. We are talking about 10 or 12 people who make BoE decisions. From informed comment outside they are Treasury clones tracked in orthodoxy.
If UK Ltd is to make serious progress as an economy we are not going to get anywhere by adhering to WEF plans for the World or by following the existing big players in the UK economy. Wherever there is monopoly there is stagnation. We have high street banks that are not only abandoning the high street, but are acting as a parallel political force for their own benefit and to the detriment of enterprise. They are in dire need of serious competition. We need politicians of vision to promote and support new ideas like SMRs and our own computer chip industry, not the third rate grifters that can’t think beyond the negative like ULEZ. If we fail to have a revolutionary change at the next election the 600,000 who left the UK last year will accelerate, as will the UK character changing 1,200,000 who came in last year. Genetic evolution is good for the species but not at the pace and cost of destroying everything we hold dear in the UK.
August 24, 2023
āSunak blocked from overruling ānightmareā Ulez expansionā
So the London local Council is more powerful than the UK legislators.
But is the surveillance software used by the camera firm legal in a free democratic Country? Where is the Court Order permitting spying on everyone? The system is not just looking for interlopers it is monitoring everyoneās activity. Thatās how Xi Jinping manages to maintain control of the people in his dictatorship.
Regardless of the maybe well meaning intentions this method should not be permitted if we are a free society. The HoC our Legislators, our MPās, all seem to be signing up for mass surveillance, should we even vote these people?
A local Council dictating to a whole nation, the whole nation uses and pays for the UK road infrastructure ā and they have no say in what one council gets to dictate.
August 24, 2023
+++
I think it is to do with the Mayorās powers.
He can do things about supposed air pollution/air quality with regards to cars. But he canāt get rid of gas boilers.
He has no power over Oxford Street or the Thames.
So maybe govt. has been advised not to push it for fear of losing in court. I daresay it has stepped back from confrontation over the small boat pledge for similar reasons? ( Unless govt really wants open borders).
I canāt exactly remember but I think that ULEZ is also helped by Human Rights legislationā¦the right to clean air.
No right to freedom however?
Reply In both cases the government can legislate
August 24, 2023
Yet another incisive article from our host that nails exactly the attitude of those governing us in terms of where they are taking the economy:
In normal times this would be called economic madness, but in following WEF policies in all manner of ways, HMG have shown themselves to be less than lemmings.
We are still seeing excessive wealth transfer from the mases to the already-rich, while new black holes appear regularly to soak up the extra taxes the Chancellor has stolen. What are the purposes of this government, for it seems never to do what it’s stated policies are?
Could it seriously be that our very own government is taking us to the exact dystopian settings portrayed in the novel ‘Dark Days of the 22nd Century’?
The government has shown that it will do whatever needs to be done to pursue their unstated aims, and it is time we realised that HMG no longer works for our benefit.
August 24, 2023
I suspect that a telling sentence in today’s post is: ‘This mirrored the Euro area whose Central Bank made the same mistakes in 2021’.
The Bank is crammed with Remainers who cannot accept that they are now free to follow the best interests of their country rather than the whims of Brussels.
August 24, 2023
It seems the UN believes the UK now owes Ā£18tn in slavery reparations. This is the true evil of racial politics, parasitism of fascist hatemongers and demonisation of indigenous westerners.
I for one am sick and tired of being criminalised and demonised and I don’t believe I am alone in that view.
Time for the Tories to decide whose side they’re on, the progressive left or the moral majority. They cannot have each foot in each camp
August 24, 2023
Why did the UN undertake this research in the first place ….the UN have become the problem, we need to leave this woke left wing institution
August 24, 2023
+++
Is there a campaign to defund the UN?
Why on earth we ever joined all these dreadful āclubsā I just canāt think!
Oh yes I canā¦.perks! ( For some!).
August 25, 2023
The Tory party is a moral vacuum. It and its government members do not understand the difference between good and bad or right or wrong.
As for national identity the Conservative party continues with its policy and practices as the destroyer of England.
No-one in parliament can excuse it.
August 24, 2023
I am dismayed to read that the oil company UK Oil and Gas has been given planning permission to drill for hydrocarbons in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in the Winchester area.
This comes at a time when not a single onshore windfarm, or solar project, has been approved in the past five years. Grant Schraps’ Net Zero department is forcing renewable companies to abandon half-built windfarm projects in the N Sea and is also refusing to invest in upgrading the grid. Schraps should go in Sunak’s forthcoming cabinet reshuffle.
There will be a great deal of opposition to this development. One can expect large numbers of protesting pensioners being incarcerated for years as a result of the government’s endless attacks on the right to protest.
August 24, 2023
Letās ask those who want yo protest to sign up to surrendering their supply of all oil and gas. Tell them how many it would take to stop this project. Then if it proves popular and we can cut them off efficiently (because of smartmeters) you can all have your way.
Do you want me to draft the contract for signature?
August 24, 2023
@Sahara gold
Yet again you falsely complain of UK production of essential oil and gas. The Avington field to which you allude is not a new development, it has been producing oil as a small scale extraction ,since 2007 having so far delivered 0.45% of its potential capacity. The company you name owns 5% per cent and report future investment to boost this figure. There is no earthly reason why any protests should be made, it is simply harvesting the lifeblood that we all require to provide raw materials for human survival in our Country
August 24, 2023
John,
Thanks for the hard work.
I think by now you must know you are wasting your time, as the political class of all the main parties, and the blob of the public sector, are all too sure of themselves and are crash diving this country into the inevitable fireball and crash.
Best wishes
August 24, 2023
Agree with the view expressed today that the BoE get it wrong . They must not be allowed to continue in their role of setting the Base Rate . The economy badly needs stimulus and not restraint .
August 24, 2023
Millions of mortgages are on fixed interest rates, perhaps for another 2-3 years, so any further BoE action has no effect on the mortgagees. No wonder inflation is proving stubborn. Likewise how many cars are bought on credit through PCPs, similarly on fixed interest rates.
The only people whose spending may be slowed by further rate rises are businesses with variable rate loans and saver with variable rate savings rates.
August 24, 2023
Indeed Sir John, indeed.
It is not as if what is happening now has never happened before…
August 24, 2023
I wish you were chancellor as you understand it all and I am not sure Mr Hunt or Mr Bailey do ā¦.!
August 24, 2023
They know what theyāre doing.
In the short term they want to ensure our economy is worse that the Euro area and in the long term they want to destroy our economy using Net Zero ā Build Back Greener ā as the āsolutionā to their false narrative that it is only man-made CO2 emissions which contributes to global warming causing the oceans to boil (Al Gore) and the planet to boil (UN Secretary General).
They deny there are any climate effects from either geological heating or from differences in solar radiation.
If anthropogenic CO2 emissions were really to blame then they would have urgently started a nuclear program back in 2008 when the CCA was enacted to reduce our CO2 emissions as nuclear is the only low CO2 emitting source of power which is affordable, abundant, reliable and secure. They are reducing our nuclear generated electricity from 26% in 1997 to a maximum of 5% by 2035 the decarbonisation date.
Instead they selected expensive, intermittent and hence unreliable, short-life, land and material wasteful, weather dependent renewables supplied by China, as state described by our security services as āhostileā.
There can be only one explanation.
August 24, 2023
Off topic if I may JR. Congratulations to India on its successful landing of Chandrayaan-3 on the moon’s southern polar region at a cost of around seventy-five million dollars.
I trust we will now begin to play hard ball with this BRICS anti-west member. Certainly the current trade negotiations with India should not be making any concessions. Nor should we be giving them foreign aid.
August 24, 2023
The Conservative Government deserves a huge kicking in the Election next year for the utter mess they have made of this country.
Mass Immigration – UP
Illegal migration – UP
Crime – UP
Waiting lists for NHS – UP
Cost of living – UP
Taxes – UP
Number of people not in work (economically inactive) – UP
Hardly a great record!
Therefore brace yourselves for at least another decade of Labour rule – which could have wholly been avoided if the Conservatives had backbone and actually did what the majority want – sort the major issues that have a negative impact on our nation.
Today on Talk TV, Steven Woolfe stated that the Government has been facilitating the small boats, waving through over 150,000 questionable Asylum claims just to massage the figures.
That alone is enough for me to say “goodbye” to supporting the Conservatives for the foreseeable future.
Our host JR should grasp that his many years of Parliamentary experience are sadly wasted in the current Conservative administration.
Many of the articles here are a good read, however the current leadership of the Conservatives would never listen to, nor adopt such advice.
Had we of had JR as Chancellor of the Exchequer (as many were advocating), I’m pretty sure the current financial situation would have been a lot more rosy than it currently is.
August 24, 2023
Off topic. Guido reports
“The Government’s latest immigration figures show work visas have risen by 65% since this time last year with study visas also up 34%. In total there were 3,287,404 visas granted in the year ending June 2023, a 58% increase in just 12 months.”
Let’s remind ourselves what the Not-a-Conservative-Party “promised” in the 2019 General Election:
1. Introduce a firmer and fairer Australian-style points-based immigration system, prioritising people with a good grasp of English, good education and qualifications, a job offer, and who have been law-abiding citizens in their own countries.
2. Fewer lower-skilled migrants.
3. Overall number of migrants to come down. (Previously the CONs have pledged to reduce immigration to the tens of thousands each year, but that was never delivered and not included this time).
4. Offer top science and technology graduates and those who win top scientific prizes fast-track entry to the UK.
5. Not allow serious criminals into the country.
https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/sites/default/files/annex-conservative-manifesto-half-time-analysis.pdf
So that’s a (deliberate) fail. With their “Australian-style points-based system” they reduced both the standards and salary requirements for the migrants to a level which effectively means an open border. Jobs don’t have to be advertised in the UK, so employers can search overseas for the cheap migrants they want without even having to consider a British national.
And the Government is importing serious criminals daily with the Channel Free Ferry Service.
August 24, 2023
Here’s the Government’s failure to control immigration spelled out:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/immigration-system-statistics-year-ending-june-2023/summary-of-latest-statistics
August 24, 2023
Strange, I would have thought Allister Heath to be happy to see āplunging fertility ratesā in developing countries to possibly āprevent hordes of illegals from coming to this āscepterād islandāā.
Or does he agree with Kemi B. visiting India and distributing visas to help more Indians come to the UK?
August 24, 2023
Re: fifth postponement of border controls ā¦
As Saint Augustine could have said:
āOh Lord, give me control of my laws, my money, and my borders ā¦ but not yetā.
August 24, 2023
In my view manufacturing is the most important element of our economy. It has been neglected and abandoned because the elites in our society have no connection, nor do they wish any, except when they can take part in and help a sale to foreign interests. Abandonment continues now with an energy deology.
They say we must welcome such sales but not unusually what is purchased can then be shut down. Designs and patents are removed from us. Where manufacturing continues in some form, profits and surplus cash flow is taken abroad.
The result of this is we have very few home owned assets. By not making more of our own goods we are in effect backrupt. Masses of debt. Whatever remains is for sale, we are desperate for foreign money and grovel for it. That’s what our recent governments have done to us.
August 24, 2023
There comes a point where steering the country towards a recession stops being an unforced error and becomes instead an obviously intentional goal.
The BoE and the Treasury reached that point in the early autumn of 2022 when they assassinated the economy.
August 25, 2023
The last three year on year inflation figures have been 8.7%, 7.9% and 6.8%. These figures imply that month on month inflation has been negative for the last two months. There is already overkill in raising Base Rate. I can’t understand why the Government doesn’t sack Andrew Bailey, take back control of monetary policy and reduce Base Rate to 5%. Politically, the result would be pure gain. As it stands, 6 million mortgage holders will come off 2% fixed rates and move on to 6% mortgages. Not nice – it will cause a lot of human misery.
August 25, 2023
your last point will mean hundreds of thousands of family mortgage payers will take the life changing decision to sell up, for what they can get, and downsize or even rent if that is actually possible where they live! For many that may mean uprooting children at school. Long-term distress and possible divorce as a consequence.
August 25, 2023
Right now, the Bank should be restricted to keeping interest rates between 1-5% – and told to target 3% inflation. It has, in its hands, a weapon of mass financial destruction – and it hasn’t done the instruction course.