UK posts sluggish 0.3% GDP growth in Q1

The UK economy is recovering but progress is sluggish, the latest GDP figures from the Office for National Statistics suggest.

First quarter GDP growth remains at 0.3%, unrevised from the previous quarter and 0.2% down on Q1 2009. For last year as a whole, GDP contracted 4.9% against a fall of 0.1% in 2008. Meanwhile output in the production industries saw an increase of 1% in the last quarter, while services sector output was revised up to 0.3% over the quarter, down from 0.7% growth in the previous quarter. This was largely offset by downward revisions to industrial and construction output. The delayed release of these figures by the ONS had caused speculation on the state of the economy, suggests Howard Ar...