It’s a numbers game

 Tony Ward is chief executive of Home Funding

So where do we think we are on GDP? It’s mightily confusing. We’re now being told that economic growth is likely to undershoot the Government’s official forecast for the second quarter in a row after worse than expected figures from Britain’s crucial services sector. Markit, the financial consultancy, reported that businesses experienced a slowdown in growth last month and taken together with poor manufacturing and construction figures the data points to an overall sorry 0.3% between April and June.

So not inspiring confidence is it? Then you have various organisations revising their predictions. The Confederation of British Industry and Office for Budget Responsibility now expect growth to be 1.7% for 2011 whilst the International Monetary Fund predicts a lower 1.5%. I have to say that where we stand at the moment with some of the worst austerity measures still to kick in, and declining consumer confidence, these numbers look a tad optimistic. I predict that these forecasts will come down again.

Good news for borrowers though. Whilst economic growth falters it is unlikely that the Bank of England will do anything but hold rates as they are at 0.5%.