What the papers say: Mark Carney, Brexit & Corbyn's silence over Venezuela

Mark Carney is often accused of being downbeat about Brexit. But the Bank of England’s quarterly inflation report is ‘more sanguine than one might expect’, says the FT. The paper points out that despite a cut in the country’s growth forecast, the Bank ‘expects stronger net trade and business investment to drive a recovery in 2019’. Yet Carney remained ‘candid’ about the damage Brexit is already doing to Britain’s economy. Businesses are investing less, reports the FT, and ‘this has uncomfortable implications’. With the Bank warning that ‘the level of investment in the UK economy (will be) be 20 percentage points lower in 2020 than it forecast before the referendum’, this damage looks sure to continue. The future looks uncertain – and, what’s more, it’s difficult to know whether a rates rise is on the cards. Yet despite this, one thing is clear: ‘At present, the Brexit process is an obstacle, not an aid’ to Britain’s economic recovery.