Debt Management Office

Lord Trimble Excerpts

Tuesday 20th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Trimble]

My Lords, coming back to the original Question, does my noble friend the Minister agree that an increase in the money supply would be highly desirable from the point of view of the recovery? If there has been no increase in the money supply because of the inter-relationship between debt management and quantitative easing, is that not something that should be looked at again?

[Lord Sassoon]

My Lords, as I have stressed, monetary policy is for the Bank of England. Therefore, it is not for me to comment on the way in which it exercises that responsibility. But the fact is that it took the decisions that it did to purchase assets under the so-called quantitative easing programme in order to meet the inflation target which the Chancellor gives them. The Bank’s latest assessment was that that programme contributed to keeping long-term interest rates 1 per cent below what they would otherwise have been.