Copy article

How do you rate Andrew Bailey's performance at the BoE?

Journalist: Jon King, Daily Express Online

ended 27. November 2023

A new report from the Lords' Economic Affairs Committee has said the Bank of England has been over-reliant on "inadequate" forecasts and should have its remit "pruned" by the Treasury.

The committee also said a "democratic deficit" has opened up as the Bank has not been adequately scrutinised.

The Daily Express is looking for strong views of 3-4 sentences on how well the BoE has done in bringing inflation down and whether or not Andrew Bailey should continue as Governor.

 

5 responses from the Newspage community

Copy all

Star Quote
Copy

Amit Patel
Adviser at Trinity Finance
Andrew Bailey has been running around like a headless chicken from day 1 at the helm of the Bank of England. He should have gone months ago. We now need an overhaul of how the members of the MPC are elected. What we can see with the current set-up is that each member has similar life experience, education and background. What we need are people from diverse backgrounds who can bring their life experiences to the table. We need real solutions to the challenges we face, not some hypothetical forecasting model. There is a lot of theory on Threadneedle Street but not enough real-world practice.
Copy

Editor
Samuel Mather-Holgate
Independent Financial Adviser at Mather and Murray Financial
Not only has Andrew Bailey done a woeful job, but he was the wrong appointment to the position. The Bank acted too late on inflation and, as a result, had to go too far too quickly. It’s also too early to really understand the consequences of such steep rate hikes, but we will see significant repossessions and homelessness. Bailey has caused a winter of discontent for so many.
Copy

Editor
Michelle Lawson
Director at Lawson Financial
It's hard to deny that Threadneedle Street has been a disappointment. These are supposed to be people at the heart of our financial affairs as a country and the Bank's handling of inflation has been a total mess. I suspect the current board are on borrowed time as the public are getting wiser.
Copy

Editor
Chris Barry
Director at Thomas Legal
The Bank of England, by their own admission, say they got it wrong and should have started increasing the base rate much earlier. Due to their lack of decisiveness, borrowers across the country have seen steeper rises at fast increments, which has been catastrophic for anyone trying to plan. The more recent concern is the Monetary Policy Committee are making decisions based on backwards-looking data rather than forward-looking data and their ruthless approach to quantitative tightening will go way above their remit of controlling money supply.
Copy

Gary Bush
Financial Adviser at MortgageShop.com
Andrew Bailey and the Bank of England were sadly too slow to act after the opening of the floodgates of spending during and after Covid. The potential effects of these unique periods, where people had excess cash and a thirst for freedom would obviously need planning for,but I saw no evidence of this. Added to the obviously rising cost of living in the UK makes me think the base rate was raised too late and slowly. To have acted earlier could have lessened the dramatic impact on households that we have seen. A positive we have seen with Mr Bailey at the helm is much less of the governor snuggling up to the media for relentless sound bites, unlike his predecesor, which led to some humiliating and negative market responses.