Coronavirus: Bank pumps £100bn into UK economy to aid recovery

The Bank of England increased its bond-buying programme by a further 100 billion pounds on Thursday (18 June) to help steer the economy away from its record coronavirus slump, but sharply slowed the pace of its purchases.

Bank policymakers voted 8-1 to increase the size of its bond-buying programme.

However, they said there was growing evidence that the hit to the economy would be "less severe" than initially feared.

The Bank's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) also kept interest rates at a record low of 0.1%.

The UK economy shrank by 20.4% in April, while official jobs data showed the number of workers on UK payrolls fell by more than 600,000 between March and May.