Chancellor Rachel Reeves faces “difficult decisions” if she wants to meet her self-imposed financial rules after borrowing costs hit their highest level for 16 years, the former deputy governor of the Bank of England has warned.
Reeves has pledged not to borrow to fund day-to-day spending and to get debt falling as a share of national income by the end of this parliament.
Sir John Gieve told the BBC the chancellor faced a choice between raising borrowing, increasing taxes or cutting back on public spending.
Reeves has just arrived in China for a three-day visit aimed at boosting trade and economic ties.
Opposition parties had called for her to cancel the trip after the pound fell to its lowest level in over a year and UK borrowing costs rose, but Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said it was “absolutely right and proper” that the chancellor went and took seriously the UK’s relationship with China, the world’s second largest economy.She said the rise in borrowing costs was “a global trend that we’ve seen affecting economies all over the world”.
Governments generally spend more than they raise in tax so they borrow money to fill the gap, usually by selling bonds to investors.
UK borrowing costs have been rising in recent months. The cost of borrowing over 10 years hit its highest level since 2008, while the pound has fallen and on Friday dropped below $1.22 against the dollar after stronger-than-expected job figures in the US.
When borrowing costs go up, usually the pound does too, but analysts suggest wider concerns about the strength of the UK economy have driven sterling lower.
On Thursday, the Treasury ruled out any emergency intervention in the markets, saying they continued to “function in an orderly way”.
Globally, there has been a rise in the cost of government borrowing in recent months sparked by investor concerns that US President-elect Donald Trump’s plans to impose new tariffs on imports from Canada, Mexico and China would push up inflation.
UK government bonds – known as “gilts” and which the government uses to raise money – are normally considered very safe, with little risk the money will not be repaid. They are mainly bought by financial institutions, such as pension funds.Interest rates – known as the yield – on government bonds have been going up since around August.
Sir John said what was happening to long-term yields in the UK reflected what was happening to yields in the US.
“[In] the US, markets are taking a different view of how their economy is going to go once President Trump is in office and their rates have gone up to 4.75% on 10-year Treasuries and ours have gone up in parallel to that. So I don’t think this is a response to something we’ve done,” he said.
On Friday, US hiring figures surged for December, with 256,000 jobs added. Economists had expected 160,000 new roles.
The stronger data, along with a small dip in the unemployment rate, reinforces the view that there is no pressure on the US Federal Reserve to cut interest rates quickly in order to boost the economy.
This could impact the path taken by the Bank of England as policymakers closely watch moves made by their counterparts in the world’s largest economy.
In response to the figures, the yield on 10-year US bonds rose to almost 4.79%, the highest in 14 months.The yield on UK 10-year gilts, meanwhile, remained above 4.8%, the highest since August 2008.