BCC ups UK growth forecast for 2014 and 2015

The British Chambers of Commerce has once again upgraded its economic forecast for the UK in 2014 and 2015.

It’s almost a cliché now to talk about the success of the UK’s economic recovery. But more encouraging data has been revealed last week that indicates Britain is doing even better than expected.

The latest Economic Forecast from the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) shows that the business organisation has upgraded its growth forecasts for this year and next year. In fact, the 2014 prediction has been revised from 3.1 to 3.2 per cent – the fastest growth rate since 2007.

In 2015, BCC now expects that the UK will grow by 2.8 per cent, rather than its previous projection of 2.7 per cent.

Even though a rise of 0.1 percentage points is tiny, it still represents a significant step as the UK continues to outperform expectations.

BCC says that its revisions were based on the good news continuing to come out of the labour market, with employment on the rise, and the Office of National Statistics’ decision to increase its estimate of GDP growth in the second quarter of the year. Growth is also anticipated to surpass expectations in the next few months to the end of the year.

BCC director general John Longworth says that that to ensure growth is sustained, Britain will have to do more to become less dependent on consumption.

With that in mind, he says it is “disappointing” that export growth has had to be downgraded from 1.9 to 0.8 per cent for this year. A smaller revision, from 4.2 to 4.1 per cent, was introduced to the projections for 2015.

“The UK must aim higher than accepting growth rates that simply go back to where they were before the recession, or worse – fall even lower,” Mr Longworth explains.

“If we are to maintain a world-leading growth performance, we need a long-term partnership between government and business – with ministers unblocking infrastructure projects and improving access to finance so firms across the UK can invest, create jobs and export.”