After Thatcher's Bruges speech in September 1988 and her increasing hostility to a European currency in the last years of her premiership, Powell made many speeches publicly supporting her attitude to Europe. When Heath attacked Thatcher's speech in May 1989 Powell called him "the old virtuoso of the U-turn". When inflation crept up that year, he condemned the Chancellor Nigel Lawson's policy of printing money so sterling would shadow the German deutschmark and said that it was for the UK to join the European Monetary System.