16 Quotes by Ross Walker

When you've got inflation rising above the bank's target it reinforces the view that we don't need more rate cuts this year.

This suggests more weakness and casts doubt on the sustainability of stronger consumer spending. The Bank of England's growth forecasts look a bit optimistic.

With wage inflation still surprisingly muted and an ongoing squeeze on households' disposable incomes from higher energy costs, second-round inflation is likely to remain largely absent, allowing some further modest policy easing.

Job cuts are mainly coming from manufacturers, who are still suffering. We are going to see further increases in the claimant count rate and the odds of any sort of wage inflation problem emerging are diminishing rapidly.

Overall, consumer demand looked pretty robust in Q4 -- aided by ongoing price discounting -- but significant doubts persist in terms of the extent to which demand will hold up in 2006.

Manufacturing is showing a few signs of improvement. It isn't acting as a drag on overall growth, making it easier for the Bank to leave rates on hold for now.

The deficits are bigger than expected but the underlying picture remains the same. The risk is that we will need tax rises in the medium term but there is no immediate pressure.

To some extent jobs created in the public sector will compensate for job cuts in the private sector.

Of the Group of Seven economies the UK is in the best shape but there is a risk to the downside, ... There's not much data post September 11. A quarter point cut as a precautionary measure will not be too much of a risk.