As The Guardian notes this morning:
UK GDP rose by 0.5% in February, new data from the Office for National Statistics shows. That's much stronger than the 0.1% growth the City had expected.
The ONS reports that services and production both grew by 0.5%, and construction grew by 1.0% in February.
January's GDP data has been revised up too – to show 0.1% growth, rather than stagnation.
That won't last for long is all I need to say.
Rachel Reeves should not open the bubbly on her way home from Washington.
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Well I expect the government will claim its all due to their careful management of the economy! And when things go wrong it will be someone else’s fault
Today’s GDP news is welcome and depressing at the same time. It seems the UK economy was doing quite well at the start of the year, and the economic outlook was brighter. Something must have been working.
Then Trump decided to destabilise the entire world, and the resulting Budget from the Iran war this autumn is likely to be difficult and give further ammunition to Reform and the reviving Tories.
I know Labour have been a huge disappointment for many reasons, and alot of their troubles have been self-inflicted, but it it seems they cannot catch a break whatever they do
Doing well? There is no way on earth that could be concluded, except by Rachel Reeves.
Are you kidding me!? Catch a break!?
They caught a break when they were elected to power with a low turnout and since then they have produced and bulldozed through a litany of vile bills, eroding social security, SEND reforms, disability reforms. freedom of speech, currently attempting to stop jury trails, appeared passive to trump, while cosying up to him in private, denied Leveson 2, encouraged the likes of Farage, blatantly mislead the public and appear deliberately intransigent on critical issues facing the country.
So, I think they caught ‘a break’
Monthly GDP data is a joke – too much noise.
Indeed, as you have often observed, so much is just “made up” maybe the word “monthly” in my statement is superfluous.
I wonder in that 0.5% how much of it was state assets being sold off once and forever? Like newly privatised Post Office land and ex-British Rail rail capacity (sidings, depots etc.,). being sold off?
These historical “growth” figures should come with a warning similar to that which investment products must have, i.e.: “GDP historical revisions can go down as well as up”.
I recall that similar revisions happened during & just after the GFC miraculously showing that we were not in recession, to be contradicted years later showing that we had been. I have no idea what they now show. I’m not saying that the figures are politically influenced, but…
There’s a great Cory Doctorow article about the links between austerity and fascism that Reeve really needs to read. As she won’t, and never will, I will share it here;
https://pluralistic.net/2026/04/12/always-great/#our-nhs
I have read enough of Doctorow’s work that I’m sure he is familiar with Funding the Future, especially when he was writing about MMT last year.
We have corresponded
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/apr/16/europe-supply-jet-fuel-iran-war-flight-cancellations-iea
What a sense of humour!
“In the past there was a group called Dire Straits,” said Birol. “It’s a dire strait now,………..