Are zero interest rates coming back?

Illustration by Roy Scott/Ikon Images Borrowers across the country breathed a sigh of relief yesterday as the BBC, Sky News, the Telegraph and the Mirror reported the International Monetary Fund's prediction that we will soon see the "return of ultra-low interest rates" in the near future, "once high inflation is brought under control". Such headlines, accompanied either by pictures of houses or people looking at the paperwork involved in paying for a house, gave the clear impression that mortgages will get cheaper when inflation goes down (which it will, sharply and soon, because headline inflation is a year-on-year figure, and…