Shadow Chancellor Sir Mel Stride describes April’s rise in inflation to 3.5% as “pretty shocking” and says they are “down to government choices”, citing public sector pay rises and increases in employers' National Insurance. Report by Blairm. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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00:00Well, they're pretty shocking. I mean, it's up almost a whole percent on the figure from last
00:03month. And that's going to be really hitting people, particularly on low incomes, food bills
00:07rocketing, for example. But it's no surprise. We've been warning about this for a long time.
00:12If you put up national insurance on businesses, prices go up. If you go out and borrow huge
00:17amounts of money and splurge on the spending side, prices go up. And that means interest
00:21rates staying higher for longer as well, more expensive mortgages. So this government's
00:25really got to get a grip, or I'm afraid we're all going to continue paying the price.
00:29National insurance increases with a government choice. It drove up inflation. The kind of
00:34levels of borrowing and spending we're seeing, which we haven't seen for decades, was a government
00:38choice. Those are things, for example, also giving people, public sector workers, pay increases
00:44without any requirements for productivity improvements is inflationary. These are government
00:49choices that have driven up these prices. And the Bank of England says they will go still
00:53higher. Inflation expected to go up to 3.7 percent later this year.