Tax cuts will do little to stop the coming economic storm

As the ONS reports slow growth in July, the UK may already be in recession, argues James Moore

They won’t power up Britain’s lagging GDP, whatever Truss thinks (AFP/Getty/EPA)

Fed up with the long run of bad news courtesy of the drizzle of bad economic numbers? (I feel the collective noun for rotten economic numbers ought to be a “drizzle of”).

Fear not: Liz Truss is going to fix it. Her tax cuts will “unlock growth”. Kaboom!

Torpid growth is the UK’s big economic problem and that has been the case for years. There is no end in sight. I’m writing with the first estimate of July’s GDP having just landed. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) found growth of 0.2 per cent, a little less than the consensus forecast of 0.3 per cent but an improvement over June’s fall of 0.6 per cent, which has been partly blamed on the Jubilee bank holiday (so guess what’s coming).