Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the reasons for the decline in UK productivity over the last three successive quarters; and of the comparative performance of other advanced economies whose productivity is increasing.

The fall in productivity in 2019 Q1 was predominantly due to a fall in manufacturing productivity of -0.9%. Productivity in the services sector grew by 0.2% over the same period. A similar pattern was observed in 2018 Q4, with services productivity outperforming manufacturing; growing by 0.4% compared to a fall of -1.1% for the latter.

In terms of international comparisons, based on OECD data, all G7 countries excluding the US (for which data are not yet available) experienced a slowdown in productivity growth in 2018. The UK's productivity growth rate of just over 0.5% in 2018, was the second highest in the G7.