Leading Brexiteer Jacob Rees-Mogg MP has insisted Mark Carney “should go” as Governor of the Bank of England after the Canadian offered to extend his term through the Brexit process.
Carney, previously described as “the high priest of Project Fear” by Mr Rees-Mogg, has offered to stay on “to promote a smooth Brexit and an effective transition” at Britain’s central bank, after already having his term extended once before in 2016.
Her Majesty’s Treasury, helmed by Philip ‘Remainer Phil’ Hammond, is expected to confirm the extension within a week.
But Mr Rees-Mogg, who has been highly critical of Carney for his frequent interventions in the EU referendum — during which the Goldman Sachs alumnus inaccurately predicted that a Leave vote would trigger a technical recession — said he had “deeply politicised” his role, and “should go”.
Mark Carney has long been the high priest of project fear whose reputation for inaccurate and politically motivated forecasting has damaged the reputation of the Bank of England.https://t.co/OZMpP8npmV
— Jacob Rees-Mogg (@Jacob_Rees_Mogg) August 3, 2018
“I think playing ducks and drakes with the period of office for the Governor of the Bank of England is rather demeaning,” the Somerset MP told LBC.
“It’s meant to be a one-term, fixed term of office and it’s now been fiddled around with twice… I don’t think that’s a serious way of treating the Bank,” he added. “These appointments are meant to be routine. Mr Carney is making it less routine and more uncertain. He should go.”
The Times reports that senior figures in central banking circles have also expressed misgivings about the “strange” and “shambolic” process by which Carney’s term is expected to be extended, allegedly as a result of backroom lobbying.
“It looks like the combination of [Philip Hammond’s] Treasury and Mark Carney have successfully bounced the prime minister into extending his term… It’s all a bit odd and it damages the Bank a bit,” said one.
Anti-Brexit Predictions Were Our ‘Michael Fish’ Moment, Admits Bank of England as UK Economy Surges https://t.co/h7UlzTZY5i pic.twitter.com/sC7qjtm3dJ
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) January 6, 2017
The Bank of England’s reputation had already been damaged by Carney’s aforementioned referendum warnings, which turned out to be very wide of the mark when the British economy did not just avoid a recession after the public voted to Leave the European Union, but actually continued to grow, substantially increased exports in a number of areas, and reduced unemployment to record lows.
The Bank’s chief economist, Andrew Haldane, went so far as to compare its doom-laden Brexit forecasts to “Michael Fish getting up [and] saying [there’s] no hurricane coming”, in reference to the TV weatherman who infamously advised Brits not to worry about claims of incoming bad weather the day before the Great Storm of 1987.
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