Bank of England downgrades Net Zero and cuts climate spending

London, 13 March - Net Zero Watch has welcomed the decision by the Bank of England to demote its Net Zero agenda and cut its spending on climate change.

According to reports, the bank's climate programmes will be downgraded so that officials can return to work on its main remit, namely the nation's financial stability.

The bank has been widely blamed for allowing inflation to rocket to more than five times the bank’s 2% target.

Its obsession with climate change, promoted and pushed through by its former governor, Mark Carney, in tandem with government ministers, has for years distracted it from its main responsibilities. Instead, it has been enforcing ESG disclosure guidelines, carbon-testing balance sheets and promoting Net Zero policies.

During his time as Governor, Net Zero Watch criticised Mr Carney repeatedly, warning that his climate activism and his intimidation of financial institutions and pension funds into costly Net Zero targets would eventually lead to policy failure and a distressed correction. This correction appears to have now begun.

Last year, Net Zero Watch criticised the Bank’s so-called ‘climate stress test’, which used discredited projections of a global temperature change of 3.3°C by 2050, far exceeding even the IPCC’s much-criticised SSP5-8.5 scenario.

Dr Benny Peiser, Net Zero Watch's director, called on the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority to accept that the risk of costly climate and Net Zero policies have become a bigger threat to the UK's economy and financial stability than climate change.

Unless the Bank of England abandons its fixation with green virtue-signalling, it is only storing up more problems for the economy and the UK's financial system."