Brexit is clearly taking its toll on UK economic growth

For beneath the headline figures which showed that the economy grew by 0.2% in the final quarter of last year were a couple of striking stories: first, that the economy is looking weaker than those big numbers suggest; second, that that weakness owes rather a lot to Brexit. For one thing, that when you put it at two decimal places, growth in the fourth quarter was 0.17%, which looks a bit weaker than 0.2%, and is barely more than half the 0.3% economists forecast. Second, look at the monthly pace of economic growth and something else leaps out at you. The economy, it turns out, grew by 0.2% in October and November, but then contracted by 0.4% in December. Every sector save agriculture shrank, from services to the manufacturing and construction sectors.