Zero change or growth – zero hope of Reeves being rescued

Nothing has changed – and that is exactly Rachel Reeves’s problem. Yesterday morning’s GDP figure suggested that the economy shrank imperceptibly in the month to July, by 0.044 per cent – which, to the nearest tenth of 1 per cent, is zero. And that was the official number published by the Office for National Statistics.

- By JOHN RENTOUL

This accident of rounding gives us a true picture, which is that of zero growth.

We cannot tell much from one month's statistics, which bobble up and down before being revised, but the longer view tells us that the economy is bumping along, growing slowly, better than Germany and France and enough to keep us out of recession. But still slower than the average of the G7 countries, let alone Labour's absurd target of the fastest growth in the G7.

The chancellor is running out of time before the autumn Budget. She set the date for that as late as she could, on 26 November, in the hope that something would turn up. Instead, all she did was to allow a few more weeks of news stories speculating about tax rises, and "your money" features in the newspapers advising readers on how to take cash out of pension funds and avoid inheritance tax.

The timer starts running on Wednesday, 10 weeks before the Budget, when the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) and the Treasury start exchanging forecasts and proposed tax and spending changes in order to arrive at an agreed position by the day itself.