The Bank of England's (BOE's) Monetary Policy Committee has voted to maintain its quantitative easing programme at £175 billion, despite inflation falling to its lowest level in five years.Sterling was down in early foreign exchange trading today (October 13th) ahead of the BOE's announcement, with many traders speculating that the central bank would announce another cash injection into the UK economy to sidestep deflationary risks.Speaking to Bloomberg, Lee Hardman, a currency strategist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, said that "the pessimism about the pound is approaching very elevated levels", with many traders anticipating that the inflation report would force the bank's hand.However, in its statement this afternoon, the committee refrained from extending the controversial asset purchase programme and also voted in favour of maintaining interest rates at 0.5 per cent, a record low for the institution.The committee last cut the base rate in March, reducing it by 25 basis points at the same time as it announced its asset purchase programme, which was originally capped at £75 billion.