Ward: MPC should hike rates imminently

The Monetary Policy Committee should have started raising the base interest rate last summer to combat inflation and must look to hike rates as soon as possible, said Henderson's Simon Ward.

The chief economist said the inflation problems we now have would be much less intense if the MPC had bumped rates last year, up from historic lows at 0.5% "Yet there does not seem much likelihood that we will get a rate rise next month, so I think high inflation in the UK is becoming entrenched," he added. Inflation came down in March by 0.4% to hit 4%, although this is still double the Bank of England's target inflation rate. Ward said: "We will see inflation come down next year, for technical reasons related to the VAT hike dropping out of the comparison and commodity prices lev...