opening remarks at the econome launch event remarks given by mark carney, governor of the bank of england court room, bank of england 27 april 2018 i am grateful to jennifer nemeth for her assistance in preparing these remarks and to david bholat, andreas joseph and john lowes for their work on the data analysis, and rupal patel, emma sinclair and ratidzo starkey for their help on the background research. all speeches are available online at www. bankofengland. co. uk / speeches welcome good afternoon and welcome to the bank of england. we are here today to discuss the value of an economics education and to launch formally the bank ’ s new education outreach initiatives, in particular the teaching materials we have cleverly dubbed “ econome ”. we think economics education is important for three reasons : 1. it helps young people understand the world around them and equips them with the skills to make important financial decisions throughout their lives ; 2. it demystifies the bank of england ’ s role, helping make what we do more effective while also holding us to account ; and 3. it can inspire more young people into careers in economics, finance and business, improving diversity in these fields while fostering more sustainable growth for all. the demand for improving economics education is there – over three quarters of the public believe that economics should be taught in schools. the supply isn ’ t. only a third of schools offer children the option to study economics from the age of 14. to help on the supply side the bank has developed an education outreach strategy with three components : 1. econome : which includes free lesson plans and supporting materials for teachers to use in their classrooms ; 2. bank ambassadors : colleagues below the director level at the bank who volunteer to visit schools across the country to explain the bank of england ’ s role ; and 3. school visits by senior bank and policy committee members : to spark young people ’ s interest in economics and to inspire them to pursue a career in related fields. let me say a bit more about why we are doing this. may 2017 survey conducted by ing and the economics network, available at : https : / / www. economicsnetwork. ac. uk / research / understandingecon see haldane, a “ everyday economics ”, birmingham 2017 all speeches are available online at www. bankofengland. co. uk / speeches the first objective is to help young people understand the economy and to make

the years leading up to the start of the crisis there was a dearth of prudential supervision, but i am quite prepared to acknowledge that there have been periods where the opposite has been true. my point here is that i don ’ t think the system of integrated regulation demonstrated the ability to deliver a stable equilibrium of conduct and prudential supervision. third, there is something of an inbuilt tendency within integrated regulation to play down the active debate of issues where conduct and prudential regulators find themselves with potentially conflicting objectives. of course, it can be said that the “ twin peaks ” approach that we are introducing could lead to endless debate and no outcomes. my own view is that that is not correct, and that the benefits of clarity in defining the objectives of the pra and the new conduct authority, the fca, will dominate any other consequences. there are several important reasons why reform of financial regulation will, in my view, be an important step forward, starting with establishing very clear public policy objectives for financial regulation to which we, as the regulators, are fully committed. for both banks and insurance companies, the pra will have the objective of promoting the safety and soundness of firms. consistent with this objective, it will focus on the potential harm that firms can cause to the stability of the financial system in the uk. we define a stable financial system as one that is resilient in providing the critical financial services that the economy needs. and this supply of services is a necessary condition for a healthy and bis central bankers ’ speeches successful economy, as demonstrated by the costs imposed by the financial crisis on the public and society at large. for insurance companies, the pra will have the second objective of contributing to securing an appropriate degree of protection for those policyholders. why do we need a second objective for insurance? for me, it rightly emphasises that in taking out some forms of insurance policies, the public can become locked into very long - term contracts, much longer often than is the case in banking with deposit contracts. bearing this in mind, the public interest i think justifies a second objective for insurance, which is more directly targeted at the situation of individual policyholders. in contrast as bank deposits are redeemable on demand at par value, and as banks lend the deposits at longer maturities, so they are inherently fragile and vulnerable to contagion, so protecting the system protects depositors. there are a number of important points in this description