Ahead of the election, services PMI follows much weaker-than-expected equivalent surveys from the manufacturing and construction industriesThe government was handed a last-minute election boost after the last major piece of economic news before the polls signalled a booming UK services sector, easing fears of a sharp slowdown in the wider economy.Growth in the sector, which accounts for roughly three-quarters of the UK economy and includes areas such as bars, restaurants and transport, was stronger than economists predicted, hitting an eight-month high in April.

The markets usually fear change but no big majority at Westminster means no big changes - gridlock is good, it seems, but not for too longBritain’s financial markets are preparing for gridlock on Friday 8 May, the day after the tightest general election race in decades.

Guardian Australia's political editor, Lenore Taylor, is joined in the studio and on the line by three experts in Australia's budgetary options. Together they pretend to be the budget cabinet, answering the big question: in Australia's current social and economic circumstances, what would a good budget look like? Continue reading...

But NIESR thinktank says recovery is stable despite weak productivity and troubled eurozone

Greece’s bailout crisis deepens as the European Commission rips up its previous growth forecasts

Senior official lays blame on disagreements between EU and IMF as economic growth rate forecasts are slashedGreece’s government has blasted its creditors for holding back progress on bailout talks, laying the blame squarely on differences between the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.Racheting up the pressure on the two bodies, the anti-austerity Syriza government said conflicting strategies and opposing views were not only impeding negotiations but injecting “a high level of danger” into the talks at a time when the country’s finances had hit rock bottom.Related: 100 days of solitude: Syriza struggles as Greeks once again stare into the abyss Continue reading...

Economy thought to have contracted in first quarter of 2015 as gap between imports and exports jumps from $35.9bn in February to $51.4bn in MarchThe US trade deficit jumped to its highest level in almost six and a half years in March, suggesting the economy overall shrank in the first quarter of 2015.The goods and services deficit leaped to $51.4bn (£33.8bn) from $35.9bn in February as imports rose more than exports. It was the largest trade gap since October 2008, a month after the collapse of US investment bank Lehman Brothers, and more than $10bn higher than the $41.2bn forecast by economists.Related: Why the strong dollar is worrying US policymakers Continue reading...

Federal Reserve officials have started to speak explicitly about the dollar as a factor that affects net exports, inflation, and growthIn a world of weak domestic demand in many advanced economies and emerging markets, policymakers have been tempted to boost economic growth and employment by going for export led-growth. This requires a weak currency and conventional and unconventional monetary policies to bring about the required depreciation.Since the beginning of the year, more than 20 central banks around the world have eased monetary policy, following the lead of the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan. In the eurozone, countries on the periphery needed currency weakness to reduce their external deficits and jump-start growth. But the euro weakness triggered by quantitative easing has further boosted Germany’s current-account surplus, which was already‎ a whopping 8% of GDP last year. With external surpluses also rising in other countries of the eurozone core, the monetary union’s overall imbalance is large and growing. Continue reading...

Commercial activity at its weakest since August 2013 with election weighing heavily on buildign firms who are infamously sensitive to political changeLast month’s construction industry figures add to the welter of evidence showing that boom-boom Britain is no more.Building firms, according to the Markit/CIPS survey, are expanding output at the slowest rate for almost two years.Related: Election uncertainty puts brakes on building sector Continue reading...

Strength of slowdown shown in construction PMI survey reveals how tight election race is putting ‘grit in the wheels of decision-making in the building sector’Uncertainty over the general election affected British building sites last month, with construction output rising at the slowest rate in almost two years.In the latest sign that the UK’s economic recovery is faltering, the closely watched Markit/CIPS construction PMI survey showed all parts of the building sector weakened in April, including housebuilding.

Royal Bank of Scotland’s recent losses (Report, 1 May) should tell us that if privatisation is the answer, we have been asking the wrong question. Taxpayers have taken all the pain of cleaning up the mess, so instead of rushing into a cut-price sale of our stake in RBS, why don’t we treat our investment as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform UK banking? Devolving RBS’s retail arm into a network of 130 independently run local banks, held in trust for the public benefit, could provide a huge boost to SME lending, improve access to banking services and reduce the fragility of our financial system. Such local banking networks are common among our industrial competitors. For any government to sell shares in RBS without properly considering the other options would be an act of negligence.

‘I remember who got hurt in the crash – it wasn’t the bankers’, says Tory leader as he tries to pin blame for banking crisis on LabourDavid Cameron has intensified the Tory assault on Ed Miliband by saying Labour has no right to portray itself as the champion of the low-paid after it wrecked people’s lives in the crash.In an impassioned and at times angry speech to a Tory rally in Bath, the prime minister told the Labour leader never to “dare lecture” the Conservatives about helping the poor after the Labour government had lavished knighthoods on disgraced bankers.Related: The Tory economic plan is NOT working, at all - sadly, their PR war isRelated: Labour overspending did not trigger financial crash, says senior civil servant Continue reading...

UN lawyer says tactics used by multinationals in courts outside of public jurisdiction would undermine democracy and lawA senior UN official has called for controversial trade talks between the European Union and the US to be suspended over fears that a mooted system of secret courts used by major corporations would undermine human rights.Alfred de Zayas, a UN human rights campaigner, said there should be a moratorium on negotiations over the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), which are on course to turn the EU and US blocs into the largest free-trade area in the world. Continue reading...

Talks with Brussels Group continue as minister of labour brands IMF demands ‘extreme’

An index complied by HSBC shows the manufacturing sector contracted in April, with layoffs and a cutback in procurement indicating further challenges aheadChina’s manufacturing activity recorded its worst contraction in a year in April, a survey showed on Monday, as subdued domestic demand weighed on growth in the world’s second-largest economy.

The Guardian’s writers and editors failed to get their heads around a complex exposé on which our partners in the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists had been working for monthsNewspapers have not traditionally been the greatest fans of sharing stories with other news organisations. Even nominating a pool of photographers to record an event and share the images can be difficult to arrange.However, in recent years the Guardian has developed links with other newspapers and organisations that have proved crucial in bringing stories to readers such as the WikiLeaks cables and the NSA revelations of Edward Snowden. More recently the Guardian joined with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) in a series of articles investigating HSBC’s private banking subsidiary in Geneva. The series was published in the Guardian, as well as other media organisations. Continue reading...

The Tory election narrative of an economy safe in their hands may be undermined by some disturbing trends already evident in the GDP dataUntil the moment when David Cameron whipped up a froth of confected passion at a campaign event last week, the Conservatives’ appeal to the electorate was based on a carefully constructed case about the economy.Vote Labour, the narrative went, and you’ll put Britain’s hard-won recovery at risk. Yet last week’s GDP figures, showing the growth rate halving to 0.3% in the first three months of 2015, suggest the upturn of which the Tories are so proud may already be starting to fade. Continue reading...

A Whitehall official once observed that it was his job to help government do foolish things properly. How apposite those words seem once againIn a review of my book Mr Osborne’s Economic Experiment in last weekend’s Financial Times, the former editor of the Economist, Bill Emmott, re-quoted the following remark once made to me by a Whitehall official: “Governments do foolish things. My job is to make sure they do foolish things properly.”Emmott speculated that this quote was “possibly apocryphal”, but I can assure him it was not. What it was, however, was a typical example of the sense of humour never far from the surface in the civil service, and immortalised in Yes, Minister, the celebrated BBC comedy series, which was based on serious research. Some of my best Whitehall friends helped the writers, although I could not possibly comment on who they were.People are going to look back on this period and conclude that this country has been afflicted by a kind of madness Continue reading...

UK stock markets could suffer if coalition negotiations become protracted, say City analystsCity investors are bracing themselves for a tumultuous week in the financial markets as they ponder the risk of a “dead heat” election, followed by weeks of political horse trading.Related: The Tory economic plan is NOT working, at all - sadly, their PR war is Continue reading...

Health, welfare and the economy, plus education, transport and housing: we look at what the parties are promising in each areaNHS Continue reading...

If there is another hung parliament, weary party leaders will have little chance to rest as questions over alliances and coalitions multiplyIt is breakfast time on 8 May. The people have spoken – and for the second successive election they have denied a Commons majority to any single party. As the polls suggested and most of the pundits predicted, we have another hung parliament.Ministers remain ministers until a new government is formed and do so even if they are no longer MPs Continue reading...

Only Ed Miliband offers a vision for a fairer Britain. His party deserves to form the next governmentThe gap between the richest and the rest was never wider, spectacular mergers produced giant companies that paid minimal taxes, and a democratic stalemate exposed the shortcomings of a political system creaking at the seams. No, not a retrospective look at 2015, but an account of late 19th-century America, a context that gave rise to the emergence of the radical new politics ushered in by Republican President Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt.In a country increasingly divided and impoverished, he brokered a different kind of relationship between government and the people. The state intervened in a rampant market – driven by rapacious oligarchs – that advantaged big business at the expense of ordinary working men and women. Roosevelt pledged to curb the power of business, support organised labour and spoke out in support of the “common welfare”, and “a square deal” for all. Heaven knows what the early 21st-century press in Britain would have made of Red Ted. Continue reading...

The billionaire admits surprise that low rates have not caused inflation and tells shareholders the dollar will still be the world’s reserve currency in half a centuryWarren Buffett has warned that stock prices will appear expensive if interest rates increase from their current ultra-low levels.

Outside the eurozone, governments have no problem funding their deficitsHeather Stewart is correct that in Simon Wren-Lewis’s article for the New Statesman he argues that the purpose of government policy should be “to increase the welfare of the public” (“Let us applaud Sturgeon and Bennett – but not vote for them”, Business).However, she failed to point out that Wren-Lewis also gave lie to the argument that the government can run out of money to do what is necessary and thereby perpetuates the myth started by Liam Byrne, the former Treasury chief secretary who left a note for his successor, David Laws, saying: “I’m afraid to tell you there’s no money left.” Continue reading...

Appeal to Greece’s millions of tourists comes as government plans higher VAT rate on islands most popular with visitorsGreece’s tourism chief has appealed to the millions of Britons planning to visit the crisis-hit country this year to use credit cards as much as possible.The move comes as the government in Athens has signalled that it plans to raise VAT rates on some holiday islands. Continue reading...

New British CEO Steve Easterbrook set to unveil turnaround plan to bring back lost customers and profits as rivals muscle in on burger marketLast weekend Steve Easterbrook, the new British chief executive of McDonald’s and lifelong fan of the less-than-glamorous Watford Football Club, celebrated as his team secured promotion back to the Premier League after an eight-year absence. “Incredible achievement. Great run-in under pressure. Faultless,” he tweeted before turning back to his own personal challenge: How to resurrect the world’s biggest burger chain.Related: How McDonald's took over the world: in picturesRelated: McDonald's: a brief history in 15 facts Continue reading...

Downbeat Markit/Cips report adds evidence to claims that economy is losing momentum with factory orders far weaker than forecastThe Conservatives have suffered another blow to their track record on the economy from a surprise slowdown in manufacturing and fresh evidence that consumers are being relied on to drive the flagging recovery.With less than a week to go till the general election, a closely watched survey of Britain’s manufacturers compounded fears the economy has run out of steam in recent months. The pound tumbled as the first snapshot of factory activity in April showed companies were forced to cut their prices to eke out new orders.Related: UK manufacturing growth slows sharply in setback for economy - live updates Continue reading...

Countries such as Latvia and member states in eastern Europe have been some of Greece’s most trenchant critics, after having to take part in the world’s biggest ever bailoutYanis Varoufakis could not resist bragging. Shortly after Greece’s new leftist government struck a deal with creditors to extend the country’s bailout to the end of next month, the finance minister and glamour boy for the Syriza radicals waxed triumphalist about how he had outfoxed the eurozone.“We no longer have this unified group against Greece,” he declared in a lengthy radio interview. “We now have a side that has broken down into many different sides, some of which are very open to our proposals. This by itself is a great success.”Related: Eurozone recovery defies the odds but long-term problems remainFDR, 1936: "They are unanimous in their hate for me; and I welcome their hatred." A quotation close to my heart (& reality) these days Continue reading...

Election 2015 poses some profound questions for this country. Ed Miliband has better answers than his rivals, and so deserves a chance to governThe campaign is nearly over and it is time to choose. We believe Britain needs a new direction. At home, the economic recovery is only fragile, while social cohesion is threatened by the unequal impact of the financial crisis and the continuing attempt to shrink the postwar state. Abroad, Britain remains traumatised by its wars, and, like our neighbours, is spooked by Vladimir Putin, the rise of jihadist terrorism and by mounting migratory pressures. In parts of Britain, nationalist and religious identities are threatening older solidarities, while privacy and freedom sometimes feel under siege, even as we mark 800 years since Magna Carta. More people in Britain are leading longer, healthier and more satisfying lives than ever before – yet too many of those lives feel stressed in ways to which politics struggles to respond, much less to shape.This is the context in which we must judge the record of the outgoing coalition and the choices on offer to voters on 7 May. Five years ago, Labour was exhausted and conflicted, amid disenchantment over war, recession and Gordon Brown’s leadership. The country was ready for a change, one we hoped would see a greatly strengthened Liberal Democrat presence in parliament combine with the core Labour tradition to reform politics after the expenses scandal. That did not happen. Instead the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats have governed together for five difficult years. Continue reading...

Slowing GDP growth and now shockingly weak PMI data show UK economy is fading fast from the housing market sugar-rush and all despite cheap oil and ultra-low interest rates. Not a good week to choose the economy as an election platformShockingly weak. That’s the only way to describe news highlighting the continuing struggles of Britain’s manufacturers last month.It’s easy to see why the health check of industry from Markit/CIPS raised eyebrows. The snapshots of the three most important sectors of the economy – manufacturing, construction and services – are closely watched because they are the first evidence of the state of the economy in the month and they look forward rather than backward.Related: UK manufacturing slowdown deals blow to Conservatives Continue reading...

To speak about money, work, class or government is to use the tools that Karl Marx gave us – despite his lifestyle conflicting with his ideasEvery year, on May Day, a spectre comes to haunt us. The spectre of Karl Marx. He’s been coming since 1889, when the Second International first chose 1 May as the date for International Workers’ Day. And although we understand that he’s the brains behind the show, we don’t like him hanging around. His presence makes us uncomfortable. He reminds us of difficult things.Over the years, we’ve done our best to exorcise him. Hitler buried him under the Day of National Work. Khrushchev engulfed him in elaborate parades. The Catholic church disguised him as Joseph, the patron saint of workers. Franco outlawed him altogether. Some countries appeased him with a public holiday; others, like Britain and Ireland, preferred to confuse him with the first Monday of the month. It’s time we faced up to the ghost: May Day is Marx Day, whether we like it or not.Marx – and I’m not saying anything radical here – was a capitalistRelated: May Day 2015: share your photos and videosRelated: May Day is not about maypoles: the history of international workers' day | Richard Seymour Continue reading...

Spanish growth highlights contrast with Greece where fears about cash crisis remain high

Spain’s economy is going like a rocket but unemployment is still the dark cloud that hangs over the euro areaPerhaps it was the warmer winter that spurred economic activity in the eurozone, or maybe confidence was boosted by a financial firewall being erected around Greece to protect against a messy default.Related: Eurozone recovery hopes boosted as Spain announces GDP rise Continue reading...

Such is the UK’s skewed perspective of welfare, millions are unaware that £12bn of Tory cuts would hit them, not just ‘scroungers’Is there a secret plan to cut tax credits, child benefit and disability pay for middle- to low-earners? Absolutely not, says David Cameron, hot denials flying through the air today. And indeed there isn’t, there really, really isn’t. George Osborne has deliberately refused to write one, so it doesn’t exist. So £12bn will be cut from the welfare bill, but there is no plan in any drawer.Danny Alexander has helpfully “lifted the lid” on Iain Duncan Smith’s plan, which was presented to senior ministers back in 2012, showing what £8bn cuts would look like. Even cutting a third less than the £12bn in cuts now planned, a working family with three children would have lost £3,500. To cut £12bn from working-age benefits is to inflict huge amounts of pain on very large numbers of people, says Jonathan Portes of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, once chief economist at the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).The Tories reckon people don’t much care – but they’d care if they knew these 'welfare' cuts would hit themRelated: Poverty – and child poverty in particular – is rising Continue reading...

Yannis Dragasakis suggests deal will unlock delayed funds country needs to avoid default as an interim solution onlyGreece could seal a deal with its creditors in early May, its deputy prime minister said on Wednesday, as the country prepared a new list of reforms and the European Central Bank provided more support to its beleaguered banks.

All the latest economic and financial news, as US recovery almost grinds to a halt and Greece’s government scrambles to raise funds to meet debt repayments

On day Federal Reserve is meeting to discuss borrowing costs, figures show growth has slowed to annual rate of just 0.2% in first quarterFears of an early rise in US interest rates dwindled on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve responded to news that growth had come to a virtual standstill by saying it would need to see a stronger economic performance before sanctioning an increase in borrowing costs.Announcing its decision to leave interest rates on hold just hours after official data showed the world’s largest economy barely grew in the first three months of the year, the US central bank said only some of the weakness was due to one-off factors. Continue reading...

Cancer taught Lain Hensley an important lesson: sometimes a business leader must let others carry the burden in order to make an impact that lastsI was on my way to catch a 7am flight to Milwaukee, where I was scheduled to make a speech about leadership and life, when I felt a strange lump on the right side of my throat. I immediately knew that something was wrong.

The case for cuts was a lie. Why does Britain still believe it? Continue reading...