UK inflation - live: Tories call for cut to interest rates despite market gloom over rising prices

Labour will be “much more ambitious” on the economy than the government if it wins the election, Rachel Reeves has said.

The shadow chancellor said her party would bring “stability back to our economy” and invest more in renewables.

She said Labour would invest more in  “home-grown renewables so we’re less reliant on Putin and dictators around the world for our basic energy needs and can bring energy bills down for families and pensioners”.

Jeremy Hunt declined to be drawn on when he thought the Bank of England would cut interest rates.

The chancellor said the central bank would cut rates when it was “confident that it is sustainably at its target”.

Analysts said the Bank was likely to be more cautious on a potential cut in June because inflation fell by less than expected.

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Today’s inflation figures show the economy is “not out of the woods yet”, Labour’s shadow Treasury minister Darren Jones has said.

The MP for Bristol North West said inflation was heading “in the right direction” but there was more work to be done.

He told Sky News: “Core inflation is still around 3.6 to 3.9 per cent, which is hotter than the markets were expecting it to be. This is not out of the woods yet. It is in the right direction but there is still much more to be done.”

Mr Jones pointed to Labour’s “securonomics” agenda, which includes measures to build “homegrown, secure, renewable energy”.

The shadow minister said: “The one reason that the headline rate of inflation has come down closer to 2 per cent today even though the cost of other things are remaining a bit too high is because of the energy bills.

“The problem there is if something happens in the world and gas prices rocket again, we are going to be back into that inflationary environment with very high bills.”

Average UK house prices increased by 1.8 per cent in the 12 months to March, according to official figures.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said it lifted the average house price across the UK to £283,000.

It represented a recovery in pricing after house prices had fallen by 0.2 per cent in the 12 months to February.

Meanwhile, the ONS also revealed that UK private rents increased by 8.9 per cent in the 12 months to April, as house price inflation slowed slightly from 9.2 per cent growth in the year to March.

ONS chief economist Grant Fitzner said: “Average UK house prices grew over the year for the first time since last summer.

“House prices saw an annual rise in every nation and region, except London and the South East, with Scotland seeing the fastest annual growth.

“After two years of unprecedented and generally accelerating annual growth, private rental price rises showed tentative signs of easing.

“Most nations and English regions saw a slowdown, with a notable easing in London.”

BT has been fined £2.8 million by the industry watchdog after EE and Plusnet failed to provide clear and simple contract information to more than a million customers before they signed up.

Ofcom said that since June 2022, BT’s EE and Plusnet businesses made more than 1.3 million sales without providing customers with a contract summary and information documents, which affected at least 1.1 million customers.

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Two Tory MPs are calling for interest rates to be cut despite market gloom over today’s inflation figures.

Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg, the former Conservative business secretary, argued the Bank should have cut rates already because “inflation is a lagging indicator.”

Paul Scully, a former minister, said cutting the rate would “bring relief to many who are fixing their mortgages for the next few years”.

A “shaky start” to the financial year casts further doubt on the chancellor’s ability to cut taxes in a potential pre-election fiscal event, an economics company has said.

Alex Kerr, assistant economist at Capital Economics, said: “Overall, the chancellor will be disappointed that April’s figures do not provide more scope for tax cuts at a fiscal event later this year.

“Moreover, we expect slower nominal GDP growth and wage growth to dampen tax receipts growth later this year.

“And the rise in market interest rates since March’s budget alone suggests he may have even less fiscal ‘headroom’ (perhaps about £6.5bn) for tax cuts than the £8.9bn left over in March.”

Rubina, a sub postmistress who was accused of taking £43,000 in 2010 and sentenced to a 12 months in prison, has suggested the only way Paula Vennells will “learn” anything from the Post Office scandal is if she’s stripped of her assets and made homeless, Archie Mitchell reports.

When asked whether she wants to see Paula Vennells go to prison, she told Times Radio: "I don’t want Paula Vennells to go to prison because she won’t learn anything.

“The only way she’ll learn is everything being stripped of her, her assets, her mark against her name so that she can’t get employment, made homeless. That’s how I want her to pay back what she did to us”.

"When people like [her] go to prison, they don’t learn anything. After three or four months or six months later they’ll be out”.