Speeches by Coghlan.

“The UK has been a complete economic mess since 2008, with low growth, a terrible fiscal position, and very low public and private levels of investment. Surely, we have a golden opportunity here to boost R&D overall and change that. South Korea, for example, has gone from being one of the poorest countries in the world …”

“Either I spend £500 more on defence personally through my taxes, or we destroy the welfare budget. Dr Paolo Surico testified to this Committee: “Historically, for the UK and the US, more than 80% of that increased borrowing due to the defence budget has been paid back by higher economic growth, not higher taxes or high…”

“Mr Warner, you were making me quite depressed earlier.”

“Ms Retter, I just want to come in quickly on the procurement point. If you look at business management theory, it is almost impossible to change an existing organisational culture substantially, which is why you see start-ups succeeding against incumbents over the long run. A classic case study is Blockbuster versus Ne…”

“I entirely agree, and it would solve both our economic and our defence problems in one go. Mr Retter, to your earlier point on finance mechanisms, surely you have an opportunity here as well to issue debt at a higher credit rating than we can, particularly in defence, and fund this R&D rather than in other areas. Of co…”

“Because the overall R&D spend, as you rightly say, is quite low.”

“I might have written to the Chancellor to suggest things such as that.”

“Right there for R&D.”

“T7. Last year, almost 4,000 non-commissioned officers—an entire brigade—left the British Army. One of them, an infantryman who has had four tours of Iraq and Afghanistan, told me that the reason he was leaving was that, whatever the policy says, in practice late entry officers are almost always employed only in adminis…”

“On the specific point about not being broad-based in hospitality and IT, on hospitality, one could perhaps argue that a lot of that has been driven by tax increases and national insurance in a low-margin industry. Perhaps with IT, changes to AI could be driving that sector. Would you think that is so?”

“Dr Mann, how sensitive is wage growth to unemployment? Could stagflation become a reality?”

“The discussion on productivity is very interesting. John Van Reenen, who is obviously close to the Government, as a former chief economic adviser, has calculated that the impressive output numbers on 14 May mean that productivity has increased at an annualised rate of 1.6% since the Government were elected, versus 0.3%…”

“So you are confident that expectations are not de-anchored yet.”

“But the MPR does note that firms are more likely to raise prices in response to inflation. Could this initiate a wage price spiral?”

“Roger Bootle, adviser at Capital Economics, notes that the previous inflation in 2022 was accompanied by a sharp rise in broad money supply, but we are not seeing that this time round. Andrew Bailey, do you take any comfort in the slow growth in money supply?”

“Governor, you talk about inflation expectations. Do you get any comfort from the fact that the MPR indicates household inflation expectations have risen in the short run, but only slightly in the long run, and perhaps they are not de-anchored and therefore rates might return to target in the medium term?”

“Exactly, I thought I needed to. Professor Elmendorf, thank you for coming. The OBR forecasts are based on a five-year timeframe. My understanding is that the CBO uses a 10-year timeframe. Should the OBR consider using a more long-term forecast like CBO, and, if so, why?”

“Aghion and Howitt’s endogenous growth theory has shown that policies such as education, R&D and innovation drive productivity enhancements, but they take longer than five years, generally, to come in. Is that a major consideration here? Obviously, against that is also the five-year electoral cycle.”

“I should declare an interest as an alumna of Harvard Kennedy School.”

“What timeframes do you use in the CPB?”