1946

The Bank of England was nationalized, which might seem at first sight to be a far reaching measure, but actually made little difference in practice. Yes, the state did acquire all the shares in the Bank of England, they now belong to the Treasury and are held in trust by the Treasury Solicitor.

However, the government had no money to pay for the shares, so instead of receiving money for their shares, the shareholders were issued with government stocks. Although the state now received the operating profits of the bank, this was offset by the fact that the government now had to pay interest on the new stocks it had issued to pay for the shares.

So, although the Bank of England is now state-owned, the fact is that the British money supply is once again almost entirely in private hands, with 97% of it being in the form of interest bearing loans of one sort or another, created by private commercial banks.

As a result of this, the bank is largely controlled and run by those from the world of commercial banking and conventional economics. The members of the Court of Directors, who set policy and oversee its functions, are drawn almost entirely from the world of banks, insurance, economists and big business.

Bank of England

Although the Bank of England is called a central bank it is now essentially a regulatory body that supports and oversees the existing system. It is sometimes referred to as "the lender of last resort," in so far as one of its functions as the bankers' bank is to support any bank or financial institution that gets into difficulties and suffers a run on its liquid assets.

Interestingly, in these circumstances, it is not obliged to disclose details of any such measures, the reason being so as to avoid a crisis in confidence.