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BRITAIN-BUDGET-GROWTH
UK slashes 2019 economic growth forecast: budget
LONDON, March 14, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – Britain on Wednesday slashed its 2019
economic growth forecast, as finance minister Philip Hammond said lifting
Brexit’s “cloud of uncertainty” was parliament’s “most urgent task”.
The UK economy is forecast to grow by 1.2 percent this year, sharply down
on the government’s prediction of 1.6 percent in October, Hammond said as he
gave a budget update hours before MPs vote on whether to allow the country to
leave the EU with no deal.
Analysts expect parliament instead to favour delaying Britain’s departure
beyond the March 29 exit date, in a further vote due Thursday.
This is after parliament on Tuesday overwhelmingly rejected the country’s
draft Brexit divorce agreement with Brussels.
“I am acutely conscious that the House (of Commons) has other pressing
matters on its mind today,” Chancellor of the Exchequer Hammond told MPs
after announcing that British gross domestic product growth would be much
lower than expected this year, with the UK economy hit also by China’s
slowdown and trade war tensions.
“Last night’s vote leaves a cloud of uncertainty hanging over our economy
and… our most urgent task in this House is to lift that uncertainty,”
Hammond said in his budget address.
“Leaving with ‘no deal’ would mean significant disruption in the short and
medium term, and a smaller, less prosperous economy in the long term than if
we leave with a deal — higher unemployment, lower wages, higher prices in
the shops.
“That is not what the British people voted for in June 2016” to leave the
EU, the chancellor added.
Hammond added that the UK economy was expected to grow by 1.4 percent in
2020, unchanged from the government’s October forecast.
BSS/AFP/HR/0945