british gas admits there s no excuse for using debt agencies who broke into homes to fit prepayment meters. and, we speak to microsoft s bill gates about covid, vaccines and conspiracy theories. i guess people are looking for the bogeyman behind the curtain, the over simplistic explanation. and coming up on the bbc news channel. manchester united say they will conduct their own process before determining the future of their player, mason greenwood, after assault charges were dropped against him today. good evening. the bank of england has raised interest rates to the highest level for more than 1a years, with inevitable consequences for people with mortgages, credit card debt and other borrowing. the rise by 0.5 percentage point to 4% is yet another attempt to control inflation. the bank confirmed that the economy is set to enter recession this year, but it said the recession could be less pronounced than previously thought, as there are early signs that the economy is st
welcome to the programme. there are tentative signs that inflation is coming under control, and the recession forecast last year will be shallower and shorter than expected. butjust to make sure, the central banks are raising the interest rates again. yesterday it was the fed, today the bank of england increased the base rate, half a point, to 4% the highest it has been in m years. we think inflation will come down rapidly, and a lot of that is down to energy prices, which have fallen rapidly. but i m afraid there are big risks out there which mean that it may not happen in that way. yet we re still seeing stronger pressure from price and wage setting in the economy in the question is, will that start to ease off? coinciding with the bank s decision came a profit announcement from shell and a rather blunt illustration of why we re all getting poorer. the oil and gas giant has reaped profits of £40 billion last year. the taxman has reaped far less. shell said it paid $1