Labour’s first growth figures are seriously disappointing

Forecasts are one thing, results are another. It’s a tough morning for the government, as the Office for National Statistics publishes the first quarterly growth figures since Labour entered Downing Street. The figures are disappointing: the UK economy only managed to grow by 0.1 per cent between July and September, lower than had been expected (market consensus was 0.2 per cent). Furthermore, GDP fell by 0.1 per cent in September this year, with production output – which contracted by 0.5 per cent – acting as the main contributor to the fall.

The news lands just after Rachel Reeves’s first Mansion House speech, where free trade, city regulation and pension reform were all mentioned as part of Labour’s strategy to grow the size of the economy.