The message from the Bank of England was crystal clear: having declined to take action to bring inflation back to its 2% target for the past four years, Threadneedle Street has no intention of changing course now. Policy will remain unchanged, or even become a little looser, even though the Bank estimates it will be 2015 before the annual increase in the cost of living is back on track. In the past, such a forecast would have been enough to prompt a tightening of policy. The Bank's monetary policy committee would have raised interest rates to dampen inflationary pressure. That, though, was during what Sir Mervyn King ... (full story)