Closing summary
Our main story today:
The real value of UK workers’ pay continued to fall at the fastest rate for 20 years in June as wage increases were outstripped by soaring inflation amid the cost of living crisis.
The Office for National Statistics said annual growth in average pay, excluding bonuses, strengthened to 4.7% in the three months to June against a backdrop of low unemployment and high job vacancies.
However, the real value of workers’ pay packets dropped by 3% – the fastest decline since comparable records began in 2001 – after taking account of its preferred measure of inflation.
Growth in average earnings including bonuses was 5.1%, although also failed to keep pace with the soaring cost of living.
Tomorrow, we’ll be getting the latest inflation figures for July, which are expected to show a further pick-up to 9.8% from 9.4% in June, a 40-year high. The Bank of England expects it to reach 13.3% in October, the highest since 1980.
Thank you for reading. We’ll be back tomorrow. Take care – JK
The parent company of South Staffs Water and Cambridge Water has confirmed it has been targeted by a cyber attack, but said the incident had not affected its ability to supply water to all its customers.
In a statement published on its website, South Staffordshire said its corporate IT network had been disrupted but that its customer service teams were operating “as usual”.
