Vaccine hopes fail to inject consumer confidence during lockdown
The nation’s largest ever vaccination programme failed to buoy UK consumer confidence during the latest national lockdown, a new survey has shown, as widespread gloom about current Covid restrictions prevailed into the New Year.
The closely-watched consumer confidence index from researcher GfK fell two points to minus 28 in January after a slight uptick over the Christmas period.
Britain’s economy has been hit particularly hard by the pandemic, with the Bank of England warning last week that the country is in line for a double-dip recession.
GDP is now 8.5 per cent below its pre-pandemic peak, after January marked its first monthly fall in output since the first national lockdown in April last year.
GfK’s survey showed that Brits became more pessimistic about the likely state of their finances over the next 12 months in January, with people saying they were now less likely to make big purchases than last month.
Ministers’ insistence that the UK’s largest ever vaccination programme will prove the light at the end of the tunnel for the coronavirus crisis failed to ignite any widespread optimism about the state of the economy.
Brits reported feeling slightly more gloomy about the general economic situation in January than they did at the end of 2020, with economic confidence at historically depressed levels.
Joe Staton, GfK’s client strategy director, said the latest consumer confidence survey made for “grim reading”.
“Despite the widespread anticipation of a ‘return to normal’ with the ramp-up of the vaccination programme, it is too early to deliver a jolt in the arm to UK consumer confidence,” he said.
However, Staton added that a slight hike in the public’s optimism over their personal financial situation in the next 12 months would prove the “real key” for any economic rebound.
“Confidence in this figure reflects our financial hopes and fears, as well as those of our families and loved ones, and it seems to be holding up,” he said. “That’s just as well because, amid widespread uncertainty over jobs and livelihoods, any decline in how we see our personal finances in the year to come would be a clear warning that the economic outlook will not improve any time soon.”