1957 Bank Rate Tribunal

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The Bank Rate Tribunal was a 1957 United Kingdom tribunal established under the Tribunals of Inquiry (Evidence) Act 1921 to inquire into the allegations that an increase in Official Bank Rate had been improperly discussed ahead of its public announcement by the Bank of England. Rumours and allegations had circulated that some financiers had taken advantage of their advance knowledge of a planned Bank rate rise, and so the inquiry primarily sought to establish whether there had been a form of insider trading.

The Tribunal took evidence in the winter of 1957, under the chairmanship of

whitewash.[2]

Background

The

Foreign and Commonwealth Office.[3]

The

Viscount Kilmuir.[4] Pressure continued to mount on the Government, and there was uproar in the House of Commons when Labour MP Leslie Plummer accused the Government of leaking the planned rate rise to The Daily Telegraph and the Financial Times
. Macmillan agreed to have an independent inquiry under Lord Justice Parker.

The tribunal

The inquiry heard evidence through the winter of 1957, and reported its findings on 21 January 1958. Much of the questioning was undertaken by the

Reginald Manningham-Buller. As a member of the Government, he directed the line of his questioning primarily at City of London financiers, rather than at the Government. This provoked consternation amongst many of the City's bankers, who believed that the Government was trying to avoid the inquiry's scrutiny, and some believed that Government sought to scapegoat them.[5]
Much of the questioning focused on two non-executive directors of the
gilts in the two days before the official rate rise announcement. The sales were interpreted as a sharp change in the strategies of those businesses only days before the public announcement.[2]

The proceedings aroused a degree of public interest into what The New Yorker called "a revealing glimpse into a special, jealously guarded world" that involved euphemistic conversations on Scottish grouse moors during shooting parties, cabled messages to Hong Kong, and the casual movement of millions of pounds of securities.[6] There was interest as to how efficiently and responsibly the Bank of England was managed, and speculation that its senior directors holding simultaneous positions in private financial firms constituted a conflict of interest.

The report

Published on 21 January 1958, Lord Justice Parker's report found that there was "no justification for allegations that information about the raising of the

whitewash
.

Aftermath

Although the inquiry exonerated all involved, the details of the interactions between private financial institutions, the

Macmillan Government
for its perceived cosiness with high finance.

The inquiry ran concurrent to the ongoing Committee on the Working of the Monetary System under the chairmanship of the esteemed

Lord Radcliffe, which produced the Radcliffe Report in 1959. Although the extent of the report's impact is debated, it was a further focus of dissatisfaction with the monetary system as it was operating in the 1950s. The Radcliffe Report made several recommendations regarding reform of the Bank of England, particularly with regard as to how Official Bank Rate was to be set and how decisions in its changes were to be communicated. For example, part-time and non-executive directors of the Bank of England were to be excluded from discussions of Bank Rate. Although few of the recommendations of the Radcliffe Report
were immediately implemented by government, the report's findings reinforced a discontent with the monetary system that had also been expressed throughout the proceedings of the Bank Rate Tribunal.

References

  1. ^ a b David Kynaston, Till Time's Last Stand: A History of The Bank of England, 1694-2013, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017, pg. 434
  2. ^ a b c David Kynaston, Till Time's Last Stand: A History of The Bank of England, 1694-2013, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017, pg. 435
  3. ^ "Sir Laurence Pumphrey: Ambassador to Pakistan".
  4. ^ Alistair Horne, "Macmillan: The Official Biography", Viking, 1989
  5. ^ David Kynaston, Till Time's Last Stand: A History of The Bank of England, 1694-2013, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017, pg. 432
  6. ^ New Yorker, 4 Jan 1958

Bibliography

  • David Kynaston, Till Time's Last Stand: A History of The Bank of England, 1694-2013, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017.
  • John Fforde, "The Bank of England and Public Policy, 1941-1958", Cambridge, 1992.
  • Alistair Horne, "Macmillan: The Official Biography", Viking, 1989.
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