The UK is heading for a recession, Lord Hammond has warned, saying “all the data points that way”.
The former chancellor told Sky News the country faces a “very, very difficult period ahead in the short term”.
He said he thinks the UK economy will slow down quite sharply in the autumn.
Lord Hammond said it was the “next part of the cycle that began with the COVID pandemic” when an “enormous government response” was delivered.
“To think that we can somehow move on from that, leave the tab on the table and act as if nothing had happened is unrealistic, is naive,” he said.
“There’s now got to be a part of the cycle where we correct for the extraordinary action that was taken during the pandemic.
“And a lot of what we’re seeing at the moment in terms of inflation pressures in the domestic economy is a result of the people having saved quite a lot during the lockdown period and that saving getting released into the…
