ANALYST VIEWS | WHAT’S YOUR TAKE ON THE GDP FIGURES?
ANDREW GOODWIN ITEM CLUB
It would be easy to get carried away … but the reality is that the Diamond Jubilee bank holidays have wreaked havoc with the data. The ONS has effectively said that output fell by almost three per cent … between May and June because of the movement of the late-May bank holiday and the extra one in June.
ANDREW SMITH KPMG
The big picture cannot be described as anything but bleak. Overall, output has gone nowhere for the past two years and remains some four per cent below its previous peak. And the economy is currently contracting, rather than recovering. Plan B, anybody?
HOWARD ARCHER IHS GLOBAL INSIGHT
While part of the GDP contraction in the second quarter can be attributed to lost activity from the extra day’s public holiday resulting from the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations and to the very wet weather hitting retail sales and construction output, the economy’s weakness clearly runs far deeper than that.