Latest GDP numbers show that Brexit Britain is in an unhappy holding pattern

The UK economy has been spluttering in the slow lane ever since the Brexit vote but it has still been growing. Is that about to change?

The latest official GDP numbers served to underline the message from the various surveys that preceded it: the limited growth we have seen is slowing.

The leaves fell from the economic trees in the autumn just as they did from the real ones. Growth limped in at 0.4 per cent for the three months to October.

The news was bad across the piste. Services, manufacturing, construction, all had sad stories of their own to tell. The wages of Brexit were paid by all of those sectors.

Over the last couple of years the Government has been quick to laud the occasional investment announcement by this or that overseas company. See, it’ll all be ok. Britain has a bright future.

Except that its own projections suggest something quite different. Theresa May’s deal is dismal, no deal would be worse still, a Norway style arrangement would be a bit better. But that would still mean mean accepting EU rules without any say over them. So why leave?

The investments that have emerged over the last couple years are like mirages in a desert because the vast majority of companies have been sitting on their hands and hoarding whatever cash they can find, even more so now the official exit date is looming.

Consumers have reacted similarly of late. A notable feature of the data was the decline in new car sales.

People are reluctant to make substantial financial commitments for the same reasons companies are: If the roof falls in the middle of a thunderstorm you need whatever you can muster to pay for a tarpaulin to keep the worst off you and your family.

Next up recession? That’d be jumping the gun. To qualify for the term, the economy would need to record two consecutive quarters of contraction and we’re not there yet.

Andrew Goodwin, associate director of Oxford Economics, noted that the data can be quite noisy from month to month, or quarter to quarter. That has been particularly notable this year.

The only thing we can say with any real confidence is that UK plc appears set to bump along in an unhappy holding pattern until such time as some light appears at the end of the long, dark, Brexit tunnel.

If and when it does, anything other than no deal should catalyse something of a relief rally in multiple sectors, and a pick up in the numbers, which will anyway be assisted by planned rises in public spending.

But don’t hold your breath. It could take some time for that to emerge, and a lot of nightmarish scenarios that are still scarily plausible.