Bank of England keeps interest rate at 0.5% and £375bn quantitative easing programme unchanged

As forecast by economists, on 9 July the Bank of England did not raise its interest rate and announced that it would keep the size of its quantitative easing (QE) programme the same as well.

The Bank announced that its Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) decided the size of the QE programme would stay at £375bn (€521.9bn, $576.6bn) and the interest rate would stay at 0.5%.

Howard Archer, chief economist at IHS, said: "Even if there had been a pressing case for an immediate hiking of interest rates (which there is not), the MPC would likely have wanted time to fully dissect the measures contained in George Osborne's budget and the potential implications for growth and inflation."

According to the minutes from the previous meeting of the MPC in June, only two members were on the fence about raising the rate.

Martin Weale and Ian McCafferty are thought to be the 'hawks' in the committee, meaning that they are the members most in favour of a rate hike.

Waiting for a significant rise in inflation and GDP, the Bank is expected to hold off a rise in its interest rate, which has been at a record low of 0.5% since 2009, until early 2016.

Archer also expects the Bank to wait for a hike until after 2015. He said: "We suspect that most MPC members will prefer to err on the side of caution and hold off from acting this year on interest rates, particularly given sterling's strength."

"Events surrounding Greece and the Eurozone could also very well continue to be a factor requiring Bank of England caution."