Business coalition warns over public debt and slower growth
THE UK will grow at a slower rate than expected next year while inflation will prove stickier than previously thought, according to British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) forecasts published today.
Ahead of chancellor George Osborne’s Autumn Statement, expected tomorrow, the BCC warns that public sector borrowing will total £104.1bn in the current fiscal year – “around £12bn higher than the Office for Budget Responsibility forecast in March 2012.”
Growth will hit just one per cent next year, the BCC expects, with inflation stuck at 2.5 per cent.
BCC chief John Longworth used the release to call on Osborne to deliver “key infrastructure projects across the UK” and to create a so called business bank.
Yet there were also some rosier findings from the BCC economists. This year the economy will have shrunk by just 0.1 per cent, the BCC thinks, softer than its earlier forecast of 0.4 per cent contraction.