The Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) has once again voted to hold interest rates at 0.50% and to maintain the level of quantitative easing (QR).

The QE programme remains at £375 billion.

The previous change in bank rate was a reduction of 0.5 percentage points to 0.5% on 5 March 2009.

Barry Naisbitt, chief economist at Santander UK, said: “After the major change in the approach to monetary policy announced in August, the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) was highly unlikely to do anything other than hold Bank Rate again this month.

“The main focus of attention has been on the string of positive news on the UK economy – the survey indicators of activity strengthened further in August and remained positive in September. This suggests that GDP growth will be strong again in the third quarter, although the figures for manufacturing output in August were weaker than anticipated.

“For the MPC in the months ahead the key will be whether relatively strong GDP results in a reduction in the unemployment rate and if inflation continues to edge down.”