This morning, Mark Carney – the Steve Bray of central bankers – used the BBC as his megaphone to belabour listeners with his opinion that leaving the EU is responsible for rising interest rates and sinking the pound. All par for the course…
Speaking to the Today programme, the former governor of the Bank of England congratulated himself on his clairvoyance:
“If I can cast your mind back to two years ago, this is what we said was going to happen…”
Carney’s numbers to justify this were, as Julian Jessop points out, spurious:
Here's @MarkJCarney's data, which suggest German GDP has grown by 40.9% since 2016, and UK GDP by only 3.3%.
— Julian Jessop (@julianHjessop) November 4, 2022
This is obviously wrong, even allowing for the fall in the pound. I suspect he's compared real (inflation-adjusted) GDP in the UK with nominal GDP in Germany! (2/3) pic.twitter.com/zCtQTiNT2I
Lord Lilley has written to Today, complaining about the interview and pointing out that they frequently allow the likes of Carney to bang on about Brexit uninterrupted – without challenging the improbable and illogical elements of their argument.
Dear Mr Stone-Lee,
Once again you had the Canadian banker, Mark Carney, on to attack Brexit. Given that the UK and Canada now have similar relationships with their continental neighbours (a free trade agreement leaving Britain and Canada free to make their own laws), why do you never ask the obvious questions?
If a simple free trade relationship with its neighbour is so damaging for Britain is it not equally damaging for Canada?
If we British would be 30% better off within the EU, wouldn’t his fellow countrymen be 30% better off if Canada joined the USA?
If he wants the UK to accept EU laws, does he advocate Canada submitting to US laws? And if not, why not?
The bias on Today goes from bad to worse. The reason you don’t ask these questions is your Remoaner groupthink means that, although objectively obvious, they never enter your blinkered minds.
Best regards
Peter Lilley
The Rt Hon the Lord Lilley
If a simple free trade relationship with its neighbour is so damaging for Britain is it not equally damaging for Carney’s native Canada?
Peter Lilley appeared on the Today Programme to promote the ERG’s new report ‘Fact – NOT Friction: Exploding the myths of leaving the Customs Union’ to be launched at 10am today. Safe to say it didn’t all go to plan as he ended up in in a scrap with the BBC’s ‘reality check correspondent.’
“I think it’s wonderful how you’ve cross checked me in this way, I would love to see the same degree of rigour applied to those putting forward arguments for the Remain side…”
It’s worth listening to the testy exchange in full…
“With some sadness I have decided not to seek re-election for Hitchin and Harpenden.
It has been an immense privilege over the last 34 years to represent the people of Hitchin and Harpenden and, before the boundary changes, the people of St Albans.
It has been a particular pleasure to work with an association which has been so supportive. They have my gratitude for their unfailing support.
As a result of their hard work, we have seen the Conservative vote, share of vote and majority increase in every general election – first in St Albans and then in Hitchin and Harpenden.
Now we have in Theresa May an outstanding Prime Minister in whom I have great confidence.
I profoundly hope she will be returned with a strong mandate to complete the process of leaving the EU and to seize the opportunities which regaining control of our laws, border, money and trade will give our country.
She, and whoever the people of Hitchin and Harpenden elect to succeed me, will have my full support.”
The Tories have got a little list of people to replace him…
Gordon Brown, Ed Miliband, Ed Davey and Philip Hammond all claimed levies on energy bills to fund renewables would eventually bring down costs for ordinary households. Eight years on from the passage of the Climate Change Act – the world’s toughest decarbonisation law – a damning report from the GWPF reveals the levies are having exactly the opposite effect: the switch to green sources will mean a £319 billion cost to the economy by 2030. That’s over three times the annual NHS England budget and will be passed onto consumers…
Peter Lilley’s Cost Of The Climate Change Act sets the figure in household terms:
“These costs place a cumulative £10,800 burden on each household, between 2014 and 2030. This is money that could be spent on families’ own priorities, and in more efficient sectors of the economy.”
The report also exposes the Act’s demanding emissions targets as unworkable. The law imposed cuts of 35% from the 1990 level by 2020, and 80% by 2050. But these are structurally impossible as total energy output will have to triple in order to meet them, and even then the power for millions of electric cars and green homes will have to come almost entirely from renewable sources. Conclusive evidence the Act was hot air…
