Balance of payments — record deficit

Britain’s trading position with the rest of the world continued breaking records for the wrong reasons in 2014, official figure show.

The UK’s current account deficit was a record £97.92 billion in 2014. That’s a higher figure than the £76.66 billion in 2013 — a record deficit at the time.

On the positive side, the trade in services surplus was a record £85.86 billion last year and up from a surplus of £78.87 billion the year before.

However, the trade in goods deficit worsened to £119.61 billion from £112.6 billion in 2013.

Imports of goods fell by £6.89 billion, primarily due to lower imports of oil which fell by £6.23 billion. Offsetting that fall, imports of finished manufactured goods rose by £5.6 billion last year.

However, the overall deficit worsened because exports of goods fell by more — £13.9 billion. This was mainly due to lower oil exports and exports of semi-manufactured goods which fell by £5.86 billion and £4.09 billion respectively.

A current account deficit of £109.21 billion was recorded with the EU in 2014, compared with a deficit of £89.08 billion the year before. The deficit on trade and services widened to £61.58 billion as a result of a widening in the trade deficit to £77.0 billion.

Last year, the current account with non-EU countries showed a smaller surplus of £11.29 billion compared with a surplus of £12.43 billion in 2013.

www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171778_400416.pdf