BoE votes unanimously to hold rates

Bank of England policymakers voted unanimously to hold interest rates at a record low point and maintain so-called quantitative easing earlier this month, minutes of the meeting showed yesterday.

On June 4, the BoE's nine-member monetary policy committee froze the key rate at 0.50 per cent for the third month in a row as it battled the country's worst recession for decades.

The MPC also saw no need to expand its £125-billion (€147-billion) quantitative easing programme.

"Overall, the risk of a continued sharp contraction in output in the near term had receded somewhat," the minutes read.

"However, there was no reason to conclude that the medium-term outlook for the economy, and thus inflation, had changed materially."

They added: "The committee agreed that bank rate should remain at 0.5 per cent and that no change should be made to the scale of purchases under the asset purchase programme."

In March, the British central bank began a radical policy of quantitative easing whereby it purchases government bonds from commercial banks in the hope of kick-starting lending to businesses and individuals.