Bank of England minutes shows majority for frozen interest rates

The minutes of the most recent meeting of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee, released Wednesday, reveal that the committee voted 8 to 1 to leave interest rates in the UK where they are.

The interest rate currently stands at 4.75 percent.

This is the ninth month in a row that the committee has declined to change the interest rate.

The opinion of the majority of the committee, as revealed by the minutes, is that inflation expectations are in little danger of moving in either direction from the targeted level.

This feeling seems to be confirmed by the Consumer Price Index figure of 1.9 for April, which held unchanged. The CPI had previously been rising.

Committee members also agreed that the two most important factors to look at when setting interest rates are consumption and inflation figures.

The meeting minutes also showed that the only member of the committee to vote for a rise in the interest rate, to 5 percent, was Andrew Large. He had also urged a rise in rates in April.

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