Fresh doubts about the strength of the economic recovery emerged yesterday after the Bank of England's rate-setting committee surprised markets by voting to pump an extra ￡50bn ($84bn) into the economy.

The bank's monetary policy committee voted to extend its so-called quantitative easing programme of buying government and corporate bonds from ￡125bn to an unexpectedly large ￡175bn, while holding interest rates at 0.5 per cent.

The decision came despite an array of brighter economic data this week, with upbeat survey results suggesting that the economy was emerging from recession. But the central bank said the “recession appears to have been deeper than previously thought” in the UK, although it noted that the pace of contraction had moderated.