Bank set to resist QE call

The Bank of England is expected to resist calls to pump more emergency cash into the economy on Thursday despite fears the UK may have slipped back into recession.

The economy shrank by a bigger than previously thought 0.3 per cent in the final quarter of 2011, according to revised figures, while the OECD said there was a further contraction of 0.1 per cent in the first three months of 2012, meaning the economy was back in recession.

Despite the gloomy figures, it is thought to be “a stone dead certainty” that the Bank’s Monetary Policy Committee will keep its quantitative easing (QE) stock at £325 billion.

Two of its nine members are expected to repeat calls for an additional £25bn QE boost but are set to be outvoted by the others.