Mark Carney, another former central bank governor, was one of the biggest champions of net zero during his eight years at the helm of the central bank.
Carney has argued that going green will ultimately help keep inflation low and stable. But other officials have warned that faster action on climate change will come at a cost, with Nomura recently saying that if it moves faster, consumers and businesses will bear the cost. He warned that the Bank of England’s 2% inflation target would become “increasingly difficult to achieve”. .
Federal Reserve Chairman Jay Powell also warned that central banks risk undermining their independence by delving into social issues such as climate change that are beyond their authority.
“We are not climate policymakers, and we never will be,” he said in January.
King said it would be a “mistake” for politicians to “put all their eggs in Britain’s net-zero basket” more broadly or to force all companies to make deep cuts to their emissions. Ta.
He added: “Whatever the UK does on emissions, it will have a negligible impact on global emissions.
“It makes no sense for the government to set an arbitrary date to ban gas boilers and petrol cars. It makes sense to think about total emissions, that is the problem, and introduce a carbon tax on it.
“And if they’re not willing to do that, they don’t want to say to voters, ‘We care enough about net zero.’
“There’s no simple answer here. But it’s become a semi-religious discussion. And that’s not really a wise way to achieve economic results.”
Both the Bank of England and the Treasury declined to comment.