Hold on to your hats

First it was ‘inflation is temporary’, then it was ‘it might be high for a couple of months’, and finally ‘a couple of years’.

Well, where did it all come from? It can't all be Russia because it was rising quickly at the end of

2021.

The fact is that the central banks printed loads of money during the pandemic – 14 per cent of GBP and 18 per cent of all the dollars in existence were printed during the pandemic. When there's more money chasing scarce resources, the price rises.

And then Russia attacked Ukraine.

Now add some gas and petrol price inflation, add some food inflation (via reduced supply and increased fertiliser price) and finally, Brexit trade barriers. Boom, a perfect storm.

What can be done? There's a windfall tax on unexpected energy company profits. Richie Sunak knows this but his boss's ego is fragile and the

PM can't look like he's agreeing with Keir Starmer.

It seems odd that we're also raising National Insurance at this point.

And raising interest rates?

Usually that's the tool to fight inflation. But surely they won't deliberately crash the economy?

Except that the lesson from the 1970s is that its better in the long run to have a short sharp crash than a period of stagflation.

Hold on to your hats. Things are about to get bumpy.

Chris Moore Chatsworth Avenue Cosham