Interest rates held at 0.5%

RATE-setters held back from further aid for the economy today despite concerns over the fragility of the UK's pull out of recession.

The Bank of England voted to hold interest rates at their 0.5% record low and continue with its £175 billion programme to boost the money supply at its latest two-day meeting.

The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) faced calls this week to increase the scale of its quantitative easing efforts to at least £200 billion after worse than expected manufacturing figures.

But today's decision was in line with the views of most economists, who expect the MPC to look again at the impact of the policy next month with the help of the Bank's latest inflation forecasts.