AFP, London :
Britain’s economy expanded at the fastest rate last year since before the financial crisis but growth dipped in the final quarter of 2013, official data showed Tuesday.
Gross domestic product expanded by 1.9 percent in 2013, the biggest expansion since 2007, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said in a statement.
GDP had grown by only 0.1 percent in 2012, while the IMF recently said it expect the British economy to grow by 2.4 percent this year.
Economic output meanwhile grew by 0.7 percent between October and December last year compared with the third quarter of 2013, when GDP increased by 0.8 percent, the ONS added.
Finance minister George Osborne said that overall, Tuesday’s data was “more evidence that our long term economic plan is working”.
He added in a statement: “But the job is not done, and it is clear that the biggest risk now to the recovery would be abandoning the plan that’s delivering jobs and a brighter economic future.”
Prime Minister David Cameron’s coalition government has embarked on a massive austerity drive since coming to power in 2010, two years after the start of the financial crisis, in a bid to bring down a record deficit inherited from the previous Labour administration.
Britain, which is a member of the European Union but not of the single- currency eurozone, faces a general election in mid-2015.
