Although business groups and homeowners would welcome a slash in the cost of borrowing, the Bank of England is expected to cut rates by a mere quarter of a percentage point to 5.25% from 5.5%. ‘Steady Eddie’ is unlikely to have been replaced by ‘Merv the Swerve’.

The Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) will announce its rate decision at 1200 GMT after a two-day meeting.

Many economists are predicting that rates will fall further this year, but it will be a gradual process as the Bank doesn’t want to cause undue panic in the markets which is what happened to some extent recently in the USA.

What will the cut today do for mortgages? Not a lot I’m afraid. Whilst every cut helps lenders have been increasing their rates over the past few weeks, so when they cut their rates next month we will really only be back to where we were.

What we need perhaps more than anything at the moment is for confidence to be restored in the banking community itself. This is why the Chancellor’s announcement yesterday to introduce measures to lure investors back to the credit markets which provide funding for banks’ loans to homeowners was so important.