Breaking News - Jim Hacker Alive and Well!
Latest success stories are being released daily to the masses...
"The UK economy grew faster than expected in Q1, according to new ONS figures.
[Such good news it's repeated for the hard of believing.]
The UK economy grew faster that expected between January and March this year, new revised official figures have suggested.
Richard Carter of Quilter Cheviot says: 'The economy may be holding up just now, but it is asking a lot for it to continue to do so for quite so long.'
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said it now thinks gross domestic product (GDP) rose by 0.3 per cent in the first three months of the year, up from the 0.1 per cent previously estimated.
The ONS left its estimate for the second quarter of the year unchanged.
ONS chief economist Grant Fitzner said: "Our new estimates indicate a stronger performance for professional and scientific businesses due to improved data sources.
Meanwhile, healthcare grew less because of new near real-time information showing the cost of delivering services."
It means the UK economy is now expected to have grown by 1.8 per cent between the final quarter of 2019 and the second quarter of this year.
That puts the country's economy ahead of both Germany (0.2 per cent) and France (1.7 per cent) during the same period. But it is still behind Italy (2.1 per cent), Canada (3.5 per cent), Japan (3 per cent) and the US (6.1 per cent).
A previous estimate had shown that the UK's economy shrank by 0.5 per cent during that period, the joint-worst performance with Germany out of the aforementioned countries.
It comes following a series of revisions to GDP estimates, which were made much more difficult during the pandemic and energy crisis.
Earlier this month, the ONS said it now thinks GDP returned to its pre-pandemic level by the last three months of 2021, much earlier than first thought. The ONS made the revisions after accessing new data.
Taken together, recent revisions mean GDP is around 2 per cent higher than thought to be previously. The upgrade to the first quarter of this year was largely because of new data from the health and education sector and revised VAT figures, the ONS said."
Not only do we pay for this, we have to suffer having to read about it regularly.
If the ONS did not exist, would you notice?