Britain's manufacturers are getting slammed - and the Brexit effect still hasn't hit
According to the latest figures from the Office of National Statistics, released today, industrial production grew by 0.1% in June - the most recent data period. That's well above the 0.6% fall that Britain saw in May, and was in line with the forecasts of economists.
Manufacturing production was worse than expected, falling 0.3%, against the 0.2% fall forecast. That was slightly better than the 0.6% fall seen in May.
On a year-on-year basis, manufacturing production grew 0.9% against a forecast of 1.3%, while industrial production grew 1.6%, as forecast.
Here's the ONS' chart showing May's slip as part of the longer term trend.
It should be noted that this mixed bag of numbers was largely compiled before the UK's vote to leave the European Union, so caution should be urged in reading too much into the data.
Alongside the production numbers, the ONS also released its latest figures on the state of trade. The figures were broadly worse than expected with the UK's trade in goods and services deficit widening by £900 million to £5.1 billion in June. The deficit on trade in goods was £12.4 billion in June, also widening by £0.9 billion from May.