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UK Inflation Rate
Britain's inflation rate rose for the first time in four months in February, surprising an analysts and increasing pressure on the Bank of England to raise interest rates at its meeting on Thursday. The consumer price index jumped to 10.4 per cent in the 12 months through February from 10.1 per cent the previous month, as high energy prices continued to squeeze household budgets, the Office for National Statistics said Wednesday. While economists expect prices to drop rapidly later this year, inflation is more than five times higher than the Bank of England's 2 per cent target. The central bank will weigh the need to control inflation against concerns about the fallout from global banking troubles when it decides whether to raise interest rates on Thursday. The bank has approved 10 consecutive rate increases since December 2021, pushing its key bank rate to 4 per cent. Michael Hewson, chief analyst at CMC Markets UK, said he expects the Bank of England to raise rates by at least a
UK inflation eased for a second month in December, boosting confidence that the cost-of-living crisis has peaked. Consumer prices rose 10.5 per cent in the year through December, down from 10.7 per cent the previous month, the Office for National Statistics said on Wednesday. Inflation peaked at a 41-year high of 11.1 per cent in October. While the drop is welcome, inflation is still running at levels last seen in the early 1980s. UK prices are also rising faster than in other major industrialised nations. Inflation slowed to 6.5 per cent last month in the US and 9.2 per cent in the 20 countries that use the euro. Inflation soared after Russia's invasion of Ukraine fuelled sharp increases in food and energy prices, eroding savings and living standards. That has triggered a wave of strikes across Britain as nurses, train drivers, border guards and teachers demand pay increases and the government tries to prevent higher wages from triggering a second round of domestically driven ...
Britain's inflation rate rose to a 41-year high in October, fuelling demands for the government to do more to ease the nation's cost-of-living crisis when it releases new tax and spending plans on Thursday. Consumer prices rose 11.1% in the 12 months through October, compared with 10.1% in September, the Office for National Statistics said Wednesday. The October figure exceeded economists expectations of 10.7%. Higher prices for food and energy drove October's inflation rate to the highest since October 1981, the ONS said. The new data comes a day before Treasury chief Jeremy Hunt is scheduled to unveil a new budget amid growing calls for higher wages, increased benefits and more spending on health and education as raging inflation erodes the spending power of people across the country. Those demands are complicating Hunt's efforts to close an estimated 50 billion-pound budget shortfall and restore the government's financial credibility after former Prime Minister Liz Truss's ...
British food prices rose at the fastest pace since 1980 last month, driving inflation back to a 40-year high and heaping pressure on the embattled government to balance the books without gutting help for the nation's poorest residents. Food prices jumped 14.6 per cent in the year through September, led by the soaring cost of staples such as meat, bread, milk and eggs, the Office for National Statistics said on Wednesday. That pushed consumer price inflation back to 10.1 per cent, the highest since early 1982 and equal to the level last reached in July. The figures immediately fuelled demands that the government do more to help families and retirees as it struggles to regain credibility after an ill-fated package of tax cuts roiled financial markets. Treasury chief Jeremy Hunt ditched the package after he took office last week, but he has warned that this will be a difficult winter and spending reductions also will be needed. Glenn Sanderson, head teacher at St. Aidan's Catholic ..
Inflation in the United Kingdom slowed slightly last month as a drop in gasoline and diesel fuel prices gave consumers the first glimmer of hope that Britain's cost-of-living crisis may be beginning to ease. The consumer price index rose 9.9 per cent in the 12 months through August, the Office for National Statistics said Wednesday. That's down from the 40-year high of 10.1 per cent reported last month and was lower than economists' expectations of 10 per cent. Britain has been hard hit by worldwide price shocks triggered by the war in Ukraine, with consumer prices rising at a faster pace than other major economies over the past year. Lower gasoline costs also slowed US inflation for a second straight month in August, but consumer prices that jumped 8.3 per cent from a year earlier were still painfully high much like in the UK. British Prime Minister Liz Truss last week moved to ease the pain, announcing a cap on household gas and electricity prices to head off an 80 per cent ...