Osborne joy over march of makers

GEORGE Osborne yesterday welcomed a ‘broadly based’ recovery as the march of the makers gathered pace.

The Office for National Statistics said the economy grew by 0.7pc in the final quarter of last year – with manufacturing up 0.9pc and services up 0.8pc while construction output fell 0.3pc.

It rounded off the best year for the British economy since the financial crisis struck with annual growth of 1.9pc the strongest since 2007.

The Chancellor, whose promise that the recovery will be driven by a ‘march of the makers’ has taken a long time to materialise, said: ‘These numbers are a boost for the economic security of hardworking people. Growth is broadly based, with manufacturing growing fastest of all.’

Many observers fear that the recovery is ‘unbalanced’ and based on consumer spending and the housing market rather than exports and investment.

The ONS report showed the services sector accounted for 0.6pc of the 0.7pc growth rate in the fourth quarter while manufacturing was responsible for just 0.1pc.

But analysts said it was because the services sector makes up 77.8pc of economic output and industrial production just 15.2pc. When it comes to spending, the consumer is responsible for more than 60pc of GDP.

Philip Shaw, UK economist at Investec, said: ‘We do not deny that more robust exports and business investment would be a good thing. Nevertheless we consider that much of the criticism of the shape of the UK recovery is misplaced.’