Central Bank Digital Currency

Lord Moylan Excerpts

Tuesday 13th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Speaker (Lord Fowler)]

I call the noble Lord, Lord Desai. No? I call the noble Lord, Lord Moylan.

[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, it is no surprise that China is a leader in central bank digital currency because essentially this involves us all having a bank account with the central bank over which the Government can, without the most rigorous safeguards, maintain panoptic surveillance. In China it is used as a means of social and economic control. Will my noble friend agree that the British people, jealous of their liberties, should be very anxious about the introduction of such a project here?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I agree with my noble friend on the importance of privacy considerations in these matters. We know that more than 80% of central banks globally are doing some form of work on CBDCs and different nations will take different approaches. In the UK, Her Majesty’s Treasury and the Bank of England are looking at all the public policy considerations of a CBDC very carefully, including privacy.