John Houblon (the first Governor 1694)

Well, well, well, Mark Carney is in the news ‘again’ and stealing the headlines once more [this time by raising interest rates and then rubbishing BREXIT]– no surprise there then, as he is a ‘pig-headed’ self-publicist, and totally the wrong type of character for the man who is Governor of Bank of England [and Chairman of the Monitory Policy Committee (MPC)].

[Carney is the first non-Briton to be appointed to the role since the BoE was established in 1694].

He has been in post for 5 blinking years now, whence he was a controversial political appointment by Scissorhands Chancellor George Osborne.

Carney is a square peg in a round hole. Traditionally, it has been a job for someone carefully groomed within the Bank, as it needs somebody who keeps their head down, knows their onions about Britain’s economy, has a finger on the pulse of monetary policy needs, and above all, keeps well out of politics. However, hothead blabbermouth Carney, accused of being intolerant of criticism and lacking in humility, has bucked the traces throughout in all of that, hasn’t he?

Yep, but that was predictable at the very start, because when he suddenly disembarked on our shores from Canada (ex-Canadian Central Bank Governor) he came with baggage – lacking a substantial Canadian reputation [left them in a mess with overvalued currency and low investment], but nevertheless a star on the international stage, due to his countless self-promoting loudmouth speeches.

His performance here in Britain has been lacklustre to say the least, with his forward guidance being unfailingly wrong, his judgment uncomfortably undependable (unreliable boyfriend syndrome) and his interventions extremely economically worrying, and that has included super-low interest rates [Bank Rate (BR)] and damaging quantitative easing (QE), resulting in the rich with assets (like property, stocks and bonds) getting richer, while savers suffered horribly, (costing them £160billion?), and the poor getting poorer by the day.

An unprecedented significant major political interference came with Carney using the BoE to support his benefactor Osborne, by adding weight to “Project Fear”, when denigrating BEXIT both before the Referendum and subsequently – you see he has consistently ignored the rightful constraints of his position, as he somehow believes that he has a divine right, as a know-all individual, to communicate directly with the public, in an incredibly dangerous intervention, about what HE sees as risks to people, when his ‘actual’ responsibility is solely direct to the government of the day, isn’t it?

Politicians here have NOT been impressed by the man – so why the hell was his contract bloody-well extended, after 5 years of strife, by a year to 2019 by arch-critic May, eh?

Will, the UK ever get back to having a real BoE governor, who gets on with the job strictly professionally, and effectively manipulating the economy behind the scenes, without the prime objective of promoting their own persona, eh? UNLIKELY, wouldn’t you say? Do you thing that Carny will have allowed the BoE to groom someone (even a woman?) to take-over his role next year, eh?

Now, it came as some surprise to many of us that Carney chose this month to start the essential (?) long-term ramp-up of interest rates [causing sterling to rise, exports to fall, and imports to raise]. That was because the overwhelming economic uncertainty over BREXIT has reached endemic proportions over the past few months, hasn’t it?

Now, it is true that there have been encouraging factors like employment vacancies up and wages starting to rise, and at last and expected GDP growth recovery a bit in Q2, after rubbish of just 0.1% in Q1.

However, in a climate of an ongoing Eurozone crisises [involving now Italy and Spain, its third- and fourth-largest economies] which though we are not in it, will impact us, a UK dire retail landscape, and with inflation at only 2.4% against a target of 2.0%, it was hardly a good reason to bump up the living costs [like rents and mortgages (wiping-out the only ‘recent’ wage increases)] for ordinary people, in tandem with poor families being dragged into financial difficulties, and as well also as damaging business performance, was it?

You have to remember as well though, that Carney panicked in 2016 at the Referendum result, which trounced his public utterances of telling everyone that BREXIT would be a really bad decision, hence he totally unnecessarily CUT Bank Rate to a derisory 0.25%, which not surprisingly spooked the markets.

Now this month, there were conflicting arguments to leave interest rates well alone for another few months, weren’t there? Yep, why rush-in now, when not only are BREXIT negotiations in the carsey, with little certainty of Britain ever forging a good new trade relationship with the 27 remaining EU countries, but the foundations of world trade relationships are under the sustained threat of a trade war. That has been initiated, it has to be said, by US President Donald Trump’s false claims of an unfair trade system – so he is now creating chaos by renegotiation of Nafta, imposing tariffs on the EU, Canada, China, plus others, and indeed causing global trade mayhem, which could drive the world back to the protectionism of old (world trade might shrink by 70 per cent, with consequential mass unemployment and political instability) which would then over the next decade represent the biggest threat ever to our economy.

The disturbing thing about the Carney/MPC taking the decision to raise BR [a “bold move” or “half-witted choice”? BR is about opinion, not FACT you see] is that it became ‘inevitable’ rather than possibly the ‘right time’, because Carney has spent too many months of unprofessionally and unwarrantedly, for a BoE Governor, ‘predicting’ an imminent rise in interest rates [which included the ‘dead certain’ rate rise that never happened in May] whence the Bank has so clearly foretold of this rate rise, that its creditability had fallen into disrepute, meaning markets would have been shocked had rates been left on hold again this month – indeed there was utter relief in the City that the Bank didn’t back away from it, having given so many hints that rates would rise this August.

This dabbling financial wizard/idiot (?) Carney is even now continuing his anti-BREXIT campaign in the media to the anger of both Leavers as well as pro-Remainers.

Carney’s Machiavellian drama continues into its (hopefully) final Act with his continuing reckless pontificating, and making a public warning that the UK now MUST avoid a BREXIT “No-Deal” at all costs, to avoid consequential damage to the economy, disruption to trade, higher prices to consumers, and less economic activity – oh yes, that latest outburst rattled the very markets that he had calmed with interest rate platitudes, and caused the pound to fall against the dollar [that will help exports, though that was NOT his intention].

[Carney has warned multiple times over three years his unwanted opinion that he expects BREXIT to negatively influence the UK economy, but why doesn’t he instead do his job and do something about inappropriate mortgage lending that is actually within his Bank remit? He prefers to play politics rather than properly manage our economy well – he should be sacked, surely?]

He garnished that crap with putting it in the minds of all and sundry about the safety of their money in the Bank – by assuring them that it was (why raise it if not to try and cause doubt and mischief, eh?)

He still doesn’t have the ‘nous’ to keep his political trap shut, and tell any worries he has to his boss, Remainer-in-chief, Chancellor Philip Hammond – but then again, he is probably doing it on behalf of Hammond himself, who is still desperate for Britain to stay in his beloved EU, eh?

[Doubtless Bank rate needs to rise to about 1.5% over the next half decade, but we ‘never-ever’ again want to see the likes of the crippling 14.9% of 1990, or indeed 7.5% of 1998, or even that of nearly 6% at the time of the financial crisis in late 2007, do we?]