12/10/2004

Drop in cost of travelling drives inflation rate down

Inflation fell by 0.2% to 1.3% in September due in part to reductions in the cost of transport services, the Office of National Statistics (ONS) has said.

The ONS said that the seasonal price drop in both air and sea fares from high summer levels drove inflation down as, in both cases, the reductions were greater than last year's.

Food and communication also contributed "significant downward effects" on CPI inflation – the government's preferred method of calculating inflation.

In particular, increases in the prices of fresh vegetables this September were much lower than a year ago, when supplies had been affected by adverse growing conditions reflecting hot and dry weather.

Inflation for telephone services also fell in September, with reductions this year in the costs of calls from home to mobile networks and no repeat of last year's increase in tariffs for some mobile phone users.

The main upward influences on inflation came from increases this September in the price of foreign holidays and furniture. In contrast, the cost of holidays to a range of destinations fell a year ago, as did the price of some furniture goods, the ONS said.

Mortgage interest payments also increased in September, as lenders reacted to August's quarter percentage point increase in base rates. This helped to limit the reduction in RPI inflation, which fell to 3.1% in September from 3.2% in August. The all-items rate excluding mortgage interest payments (RPIX) was 1.9% in September, down from 2.2% in the previous month. Mortgage interest payments are not included in the CPI method.

As an internationally comparable measure of inflation, the CPI shows that the UK inflation rate has been among the lowest in the EU since the start of 2000. The provisional average inflation rate for the enlarged EU 25 in August, the latest available, was 2.1%, compared with 1.3% in the UK.

(gmcg/mb)

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