President George W Bush has made law a landmark $700 billion (£397bn) bail-out Bill which was earlier passed by the US House of Representatives.

The US government acted "boldly" and took "decisive action" to prevent the crisis on Wall Street spreading across the country, Mr Bush said, after 263 politicians voted in favour and 171 against. The Bill needed 218 to pass.

The lower house of Congress was voting for a second time after earlier this week throwing out proposals to shore up the US economy with the rescue package, saying it was not fair on ordinary taxpayers.

Mid-week, the Senate stepped in and passed the Bill first by adding more than $100 billion (£56.9bn) of so-called "sweeteners" to the proposals, piling pressure on the House to follow suit.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said the Bill would help "shine the bright light of accountability" on the financial markets and added that the passage of the "very serious piece of legislation" was done with "an eye on the future".

She said the US had faced "terrible ramifications for everyone on Main Street" while the world was focused on Wall Street. "We were dealt a bad hand, we made the most of it," Ms Pelosi said.

She added that she thought the Bill could have been better under different circumstances.

Democrat Steny Hoyer, the House majority leader, said the "process of compromise may look messy" but added that it "significantly improved the legislation".

He said the US government could now begin taking strong action to restore the flow of credit.

Democrat James Clyburn, the House majority whip, said he was hopeful the US had now "gone a long way to restoring confidence in our markets" and to restoring "credibility and confidence in our body politic".

In the UK, Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the global financial crisis required new ways of governing and set out new plans for a National Economic Council which will meet for the first time on Monday.

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