'Overt monetary financing' – printing money to pay the government's bills – should not be considered a taboo subject, and in many cases is a viable stimulus option, according to Adair Turner, the chairman of the UK's Financial Services Authority (FSA).

Speaking last night at the Cass Business School in London, Turner – who was a candidate to succeed Mervyn King as governor of the Bank of England, before the appointment of Mark Carney – focused on the controversial topic of "helicopter money", a