MPC ‘considered rate hike’

The Bank of England’s monetary policy committee (MPC) considered increasing the base rate of interest across the country earlier this month, it has emerged.

According to the minutes of the MPC’s meeting, there was sufficient concern about the recent rises in inflation for the members to give some thought to hiking the cost of borrowing in June.

Such a move could have added more pressure on the millions of families with debt management problems but in the end the MPC opted to hold fire until July at the earliest.

Reflecting on the details of the latest MPC meeting, Global Insight economist Howard Archer suggested that the level of uncertainty over the economy means that the Bank of England is “in no hurry to move interest rates”.

According to Credit Action, consumers in the UK pay out a total of around £258 million in interest on their collective debt management burden every day.

By Frank Charlton