History of the British national debt History of the British national debt The history of the British national debt can be traced back to the reign of William III, who engaged a syndicate of City traders and merchants to offer for sale an issue of government debt, which evolved into the Bank of England. In 1815, at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, British government debt reached a peak of £1 billion (that was more than 200% of GDP). At the beginning of the 20th century the national debt had been gradually reduced to around 30 percent of GDP. However, during World War I the British
Bank of England club "Bank of England club" becoming majority owned by foreign investors. The "Bank of England club" has also been used to describe Sunderland in the late 1940s and the 1950s, where they spent large amounts of money intending to win trophies. However, the move was not successful as Sunderland failed to win any trophies during the period and were relegated in 1958. Everton have also been labelled as the "Bank of England club" in 1970. This came from chairman John Moores giving manager Harry Catterick large amounts of money to spend. This was successful as Everton won the First Division title