While there is no doubt that unconventional monetary policies (UMPs) have helped stabilise the financial system and supported economic recovery after the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), many have argued that the economic or financial benefits created by UMPs have not been shared evenly. Some studies have highlighted that UMPs disproportionately enrich the “haves”, as they tend to hold more assets such as stocks and properties that benefited most from UMPs.3 Hong Kong has been experiencing this trend, especially in the housing market. With a prolonged period of close-to-zero nominal interest rates and negative real mortgage rates, Hong Kong’s housing prices have been rising for over 10 years. This has eroded housing affordability and widened significantly the wealth gap between home owners and those who have yet to buy a home. How should central bankers and policymakers think about this important issue and what can be done about it? We have lined up a couple of presentations focusing on housing today and tomorrow, which I hope will shed some light on 1/2  BIS central bankers' speeches  policymaking in this area. 6. Having looked at UMPs’ implications on asset prices, let’s now turn our attention for a moment to labour income. To the extent that UMPs have driven aggregate improvements in the labour market in terms of job creation, they have nonetheless failed to benefit some segments of the workforce that are the most in need. For example, many of the jobs created are low-paying and/or part-time in nature.
Five of us are drawn from the executive of the Bank, increasing to six when microprudential supervision of banks and insurers moves across in  5  Hyun Shin has set this out with great clarity. 6  See Tucker, Comments at Clare College, discussion of Lord Turner’s Lecture, “Reforming finance: are we being radical enough?”, Cambridge, February 2011. BIS central bankers’ speeches  5  2012/13. The two senior officials of the UK’s existing regulator, the Financial Services Authority, are members during the interim period. And once the legislation has passed, the chief executive of the planned new securities/consumer regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority, will be a member, reflecting, as I have outlined, the vital role of market regulation in preserving stability. There are four external members, including from the USA Don Kohn, the former Vice Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board. The Government expects the legislative process to be complete towards the end of 2012. In the meantime, during the interim, non-statutory phase of our existence, the Financial Policy Committee has two broad functions: “paving” and “shadowing”. We will pave the way for the statutory incarnation of the Committee by advising the government on the instruments and powers we could be given by Parliament. And, secondly, we will as far as possible shadow the role of the statutory FPC, which essentially means advising the FSA on where and how it should use its regulatory tools for system-wide ends. So what are those ends? They are consistent with my earlier overview of financial stability.