The bank of England has held interest rates at a record low of 0.5% for the 20th month in succession and decided to not pump more money into the economy via quantitative easing (QE).

The decision to make no change to policy comes after recent figures on the economy showed good growth - gross domestic product grew at 0.8% in the third quarter - better than expected.

The US recently announced it would make a further $600bn of stimulus available over the next eight months.

The Bank's decision was welcomed by lobby groups and economists, but a number of commentators, including the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) said they thought the UK economy would need its own QE boost to help the economy through the coming government cuts.

"We believe there are strong arguments for injecting additional QE into the economy over the next few months," said David Kern of the BCC.

"As VAT increases to 20% in January, and the deficit-cutting programme moves to a higher gear in 2011, risks of a setback will inevitably worsen."