Monthly real gross domestic product is estimated to have grown by 0.2 per cent in April 2023 following a fall of 0.3 per cent in March, the Office for National Statistics has revealed.
The main contributor to the growth in monthly GDP was found to be the services sector which saw an increase of 0.3 per cent over April after falling by 0.5 per cent in March.
Consumer-facing services also experienced a rise over April, growing by 1.0 per cent following a fall of 0.8 per cent in March.
Meanwhile, production output fell by 0.3 per cent and the construction sector fell by 0.6 per cent.
The ONS data also revealed that, more broadly, GDP grew by 0.1 per cent in the three months to April 2023 when compared with the three months to January 2023.
Darren Morgan, director of economic statistics at ONS, said that GDP had “bounced back” after a “weak March”.
“Bars and pubs had a comparatively strong April, while car sales rebounded and education partially recovered from the effect of the previous month’s strikes”, he continued.
“These were partially offset by falls in health, which was affected by the junior doctors’ strikes, along with falls in computer manufacturing and the often-erratic pharmaceuticals industry. House builders and estate agents also had a poor month.”
Morgan also stated that, over the last three months as a whole, the economy grew a little, driven largely by the construction industries.
“The services sector dragged growth downwards, partly due to the impact of public sector strikes,” he added.
Meanwhile, Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at Hargreaves Lansdown, said that the UK economy had “eked out” growth in April but cautioned that stubborn inflation is “still casting a shadow over the slightly sunnier outlook”.
“Although the UK continues to swerve a technical recession and buck earlier forecasts, the situation is fragile”, she said.
Streeter warned that, with recent data showing prices and wages are still rising sharply, further rate hikes could act like a “vice-grip” on spending power going forward and, with fresh strikes having been called, they could act as a drag on growth.
tom.dunstan@ft.com
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