"CBDCs are about ways of making payments; they are not a new currency."
"Whether a country needs a CBDC is really about the state of its current payments system," he pointed out in the House of Lords this month..
"What are the problems in our payments system to which a CBDC might be the answer? .... There are no problems to which a CBDC is the only, or even the most obvious, answer."
"Our payments system is more efficient than those in most other countries, certainly the United States."
"Most transactions are already digital, whether by tapping a card on a machine at the point of sale or making a digital payment on a computer for remote transactions."
"All of these are operated already by commercial banks and an increasing number of new payment vehicles."
"Competition has moved us from a system based on paper cheques to one driven largely by digital payments with virtually instantaneous clearing."
"It would be somewhat odd to try to increase competition in this area by creating a state monopoly of the payment system"
"Of course, there can always be improvements in our payment systems, but a CBDC is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for that.
"The major problem today concerns the cost and speed of cross-border payments, but much of this results from money laundering regulations."
"The enormous risk is that, in a financial crisis, households would abruptly shift their deposits from banks to [CBDC] accounts with the Bank of England, forcing the latter immediately to transfer the deposits back to the banks to avoid a collapse of the system."
"In 2008, when the Bank, with approval from the Government, lent a large amount of money to RBS and HBOS to prevent their collapse, the operations were covert and revealed only some months later to prevent a system-wide loss of confidence"
"That would be impossible if households could switch without limit instantaneously from all commercial banks to the Bank of England."
"So a retail CBDC has risks but no obvious benefits".
Lord King, from a position of immense experience, has completely demolished the case for a "Britcoin," British CBDC or "digital pound."
It thus remains quite puzzling why the Government and Bank of England are pressing ahead with such vigour? What are their real motives?
This week Britain will be hit by a range of horrifying tax increases which will inflict major damage to the finances of British citizens, to businesses & to the economy.
We detail 12 scheduled tax hikes below
1/14
Tax hikes are programmed for April 1 and April 6.
The greatest economic damage will be caused by hikes to Employer NI contributions. The rate will go up by 1.2ppts to 15% & the threshold cut to £5k, dragging many more low-paid & part-time workers into its scope.
The prospect of the hikes destroyed business confidence and has already led to major reductions in hiring & investment, lower pay & some lay-offs.
Now that the tax hikes are actually occurring, the pressure to reduce staff costs and numbers will be much greater.
The OBR budget watchdog downgraded its forecast for capital gains tax revenue for the next 5 years, reducing the projected tax take by £23b
No surprise there, as hikes in CGT invariably lead to reduced revenues. Labour's ideology driven CGT hikes are having the same effect
1/8
Under reforms introduced by Tony Blair’s Government, from the year 2002-03 business assets attracted a reduced rate of 10% CGT if held for more than 2 years. CGT revenues increased sharply as a consequence, doubling in 3 years.
Conversely after the Tories in 1988 increased CGT rates by ten points from 30% to 40%, revenues fell dramatically, more than halving from £2,175m in 1987-88 to £976m in 1990-91 & further still to £606m in 1992-93.
Inventor Sir James Dyson has accused Rachel Reeves of “vindictiveness” saying that her death tax raid on family businesses will “destroy” them & that, rather than raise revenue, it will cost the exchequer billions in other taxes.
He is entirely correct.
1/6
Dyson said that 60 of the top 100 UK taxpayers were owners of family businesses and together pay £3 billion a year in taxes. “Such companies employ 14 million people & contribute many more billions — year in, year out — funding vital public services,” he said.
“This is what Rachel Reeves will kill off with her budget, which introduces a confiscation of 20% of all family companies at every generation, based not on assets (as with farming) but on a much higher figure, a theoretical multiple of future profits".
Rachel Reeves is a one woman walking political disaster area for the Labour Party.
The vast majority of Labour’s political screw-ups since the election have been caused by Rachel.
Will they allow her to carry on doing this?
1/9
The family farm tax row, which will both dominate the news for months and threaten Labour’s 100 rural seats was a totally unnecessary blunder.
Infuriating farmers for a measly £560m, enough to keep the NHS running for 25 hours, was a major mis-step.
Reeves adopted a badly researched policy pushed by far left academics and failed to consult the line Ministry, DEFRA, who weren’t even told about her tax grab until the night before the budget.
The Labour Party appears to have adopted the "big lie" approach to communicating its tax and economic policy.
Labour's latest brazen lie is that they didn't hike NI when in fact it was the biggest tax increase in the budget.
This thread examines the big lie technique
1/9
“And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.”
― George Orwell, 1984
George Orwell developed the concept of big lie propaganda in his book 1984, describing techniques used by the Nazi and Soviet regimes
Goebbels insisted "all effective propaganda must be limited to a very few points and must harp on these slogans until the last member of the public understands."