The Bank of England said interest rates probably needed to rise sooner and by a bit more than it thought three months ago, after it raised its economic growth forecasts for Britain due to a strong global recovery.

The BoE holds its interest rate at 0.5 percent, giving them time to assess how the world's sixth-biggest economy copes with the approach of Brexit. Meanwhile, the BoE nudged up its economic growth forecasts for Britain to show an average annual expansion of 1.75 percent over the next three years. That was a lot weaker than its expectation of nearly 4 percent growth. The BoE linked the sluggish British outlook to slower growth in the labour force, due to fewer immigrants coming to Britain after Brexit and the country's ageing population.