British government borrowing in June fell to its lowest point in seven years, but failed to beat analysts’ upbeat predictions.
According to the Office of National Statistics Britain’s headline public borrowing fell to 9.4 billion pounds in June, compared to 10.2 billion pounds a year earlier. However these results came as a disappointment to economists, who predicted a fall to £8.5 billion. This data weighed on investors, with the FTSE 100 failing to break out of the red, trading five points down at 6,784.
‘With June’s improvement being less than expected, the chancellor is now slightly off track to meet the reduced fiscal targets for 2015/16 contained in July’s summer budget,’ Howard Archer, chief European and UK economist at IHS Global Insight, told Citywire.
‘However, this is nothing for George Osborne to worry about at this stage given that he is still very close to target – and public finances can be volatile from month to month and subject to appreciable revisions.’
The report continued, revealing public sector net debt excluding state-controlled banks totalling 1.513 trillion pounds in June – equivalent to 81.5 percent of GDP. George Osborne took the opportunity to push back the date that Britain is scheduled to wipe out the deficit altogether until 2019/20.
