If some people are more motivated than others by profit, you would like to drive them out of civilised society; I on the other hand would invite them in, because I believe them to be essential to support the people.
Confidence was high; firms routinely complained of labour shortages; inflation was tending to rise, worryingly so in the second half of 2007; and demand for credit was strong. In this environment, the Board was running tight monetary policy to contain inflation. We now know (but could not know for sure at the time) that CPI inflation was on its way to 5 per cent.