UK record employment increases likelihood of interest rate hike

Regular pay is up by 2.9% on a year ago, which could make an August interest rate rise more likely

The prospect of an August increase in interest rates from the Bank of England has loomed larger after the latest official figures showed that strong jobs growth had pushed the UK's employment rate to a fresh record in the first three months of 2018.

Despite the slowest growth in more than five years, the Office for National Statistics said there were 32.34 million people in work in the first quarter of the year, an increase of 197,000 on the previous quarter and up by 396,000 on the first three months of 2017.

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