UK economic growth remained at 0.5% in the three months to September, revised official figures showed today.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said its second estimate for gross domestic product in the third quarter was unchanged from earlier estimates.
Analysts had initially forecast that growth would slow slightly from 0.7% in the second quarter of the year to 0.6% in the third.
The news will ease pressure on the Bank of England to raise interest rates, which have been held at an all-time low of 0.5% since March 2009.
Bank of England governor Mark Carney said to MPs at the Treasury Select Committee this week that rates would stay low "for some time".
Most economists expect the Bank's Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) to raise interest rates next year or in 2017.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here