15/07/2008

Food And Fuel Costs Push Inflation To 3.8%

The continuing food and fuel price rises pushed inflation to 3.8% last month, from 3.3% in May, the Office of National Statistics (ONS) have revealed.

Inflation is now well above the government's target of 2% and June's figure is the highest since the current system was introduced eleven years ago.

The ONS said that the main factors for the rise were the rising prices of food and non-alcoholic drinks.

Petrol prices were also a factor, with surging oil prices driving up the cost of fuel by 5.3 pence per litre last month. Gas and electricity prices remained unchanged, but had fallen a year earlier, and the ONS said that this was also a contributory factor to the inflation rise.

The Retail Price Index inflation measure, which excludes mortgage payments, rose to 4.6% from 4.3% in May.

Commenting on the figures, Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said the official figures had now caught up with "everyone's real experience" of a spiraling cost of living.

Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesperson Vince Cable said: "Even this rose tinted measurement of inflation is now showing the huge strain that soaring food and fuel costs are putting on household budgets.

"With inflation now well above its target, there is absolutely no hope of an interest rate cut in the near future, bringing yet more bad news to already hard pressed families.

"We are now facing the start of an economic climate worryingly reminiscent of the 1970s, with falling demand, rising unemployment and rising inflation.

"Gordon Brown is now facing the consequences of years of inaction over spiraling personal debt and the unsustainable bubble in the housing market.

"The Prime Minister bases his credibility on his economic record, yet it is now becoming startling clear he was asleep at the wheel."

(KMcA/JM)

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