Tag Archives: Speeches, House of Lords

  Lord Skidelsky (CB)My Lords, I will concentrate, as is my wont, on the macroeconomic implications of the Budget. That is not to say that supply-side questions are not important—of course they are. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Maude, that a Government should not be exempt from the efficiency expected of the private sector. However, in general, efficiency is closely related to investment. The more investment there is, the more efficient an economy is likely to be, for the...

   My Lords, it is always a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Desai. I will take up one or two things he said, but a preliminary question that occurred to me is: if the private sector is so flush with money, why is it not investing more of it? Why does it need government help to do so? The answer that occurs to me is that the private sector does not see sufficient demand to justify the kind of investment that would employ those funds that are sitting idle. I will come to...

   Volume 776 12.55 pm My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, for making this debate possible. The most dramatic economic effect of the United Kingdom’s Brexit vote has been the collapse of sterling. Since June, the pound has fallen by about 16% against a basket of currencies. Mervyn King, the former Governor of the Bank of England, has hailed the lower exchange rate as “a welcome change”. Indeed, with Britain’s current account deficit in the order of 7% of...