Only one in five think the Bank of England is doing a good job – but they still trust it more than politicians
Just 18 per cent of the public think the Bank of England are doing a good job, but a majority still think politicians should not be given control of monetary policy.
According to polling data from Public First, only 18 per cent of respondents think the Bank is performing well. 36 per cent said it was performing poorly with the remainder having no opinion either way.
Conservative voters and younger adults were more likely to think the embattled central bank was doing a good job.
The Bank has come under pressure for its mischaracterisation of inflation as transitory – a mistake made by almost all central banks around the world.
As a result, central banks were slow to hike rates, and inflation skyrocketed to a multi-decade high of 11.1 per cent in October last year following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
While many economies have faced similar problems, inflation in the UK has remained higher than in many western economies and the Bank has repeatedly overestimated the extent to it will fall.
The headline rate of US inflation has come down sharply to 3.3 per cent while in the EU it stands at 5.3 per cent. In the UK however, it stands at 6.8 per cent. A recent report suggested inflation would remain above the Bank’s target until 2025.
Reflecting its failure to predict the persistence of price rises, it has brought in ex-Fed chair Ben Bernanke to lead a review of its forecasting models.
Despite its difficulties in getting a handle on inflation, 56 per cent of respondents said the Bank should maintain its independence to set interest rates. Just 23 per cent said control over interest rates should return to the government, as it had been pre-1997.
James Frayne, founding partner of research agency Public First, said: “The Bank of England has been savaged by politicians and commentators for months and its reputation has clearly been damaged.” But Frayne said the figures indicated the people still trust the Bank more than “government politicians.”
“Even as people are feeling serious pain from high interest rates, people fear putting politicians in control,” he continued.
A Bank of England spokesperson said: “We know that people are unhappy about the level of inflation. That’s why we are entirely focused on bringing it back down to the two per cent target.”