Bank of England Boss Says Reeves’ Positive Growth Figures Don’t Reflect Reality – Guido Fawkes

WATCH: Bank of England Boss Says Reeves’ Positive Growth Figures Don’t Reflect Reality

Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey has just finished at the Treasury Select Committee where he was asked why, when the ONS’ growth figures look so promising for the Chancellor, BoE staff said in their latest report that underlying GDP growth was actually zero in the first quarter of the year. His answer was revealing:

“The challenge we have at the moment is that the forward-looking sort of evidence on activity in the economy so the surveys are nothing like as strong as that. So there is a disjoint if you like between that number and and and and the pattern we get from the surveys and the evidence.”

Guido has diligently covered surveys on confidence and projections from across the board. They do not paint a pretty picture…

Bailey points out the private figures are better than the ONS’ stats as a predictor:

“Surveys are probably a bet on average a better predictor of the future than the immediately previous GDP number… there’s a whole range… if you add them up… all the various surveys get around quite a lot of the economy.“

Businesses themselves are far from optimistic about Labour’s tax hikes and even less so when the Employment Rights Bill comes into play…