Bank of England brings out the tools for quantitative tightening
An away match for the Treasury Select Committee saw MPs travel to the Bank of England to question its governor, Andrew Bailey. What a fortress: marbled halls, portraits of long-dead Herberts, a mulberry-shaded courtyard and mosaics of Mycenaean lions. A slightly camp sculpture of a chap in ancient Roman kit with hand on hip turned out to be William III, by Sir Henry Cheere, Bt, (1703-81). There was me thinking it was Bailey’s predecessor, that dapper little Caesar Mark Carney.
Bailey, a clammier specimen, has struggled to establish his gubernatorial authority. Holding this select committee event at the Bank gave home-turf advantage to him and his two garrulous deputies, Ben Broadbent and Sir Dave Ramsden; yet the venue lacked parliamentary resonance. When experts are summoned
