Office for National Statistics says Britain was second worst G7 nation for productivity after Covid

Britain's hopes of being a leading nation for productivity and output were dashed afterthe Office for National Statistics amended previously published statistics.

Citing a 'manual error', the data agency revealed Britain is actually the second worst G7 economy forproductivity growth on the back of Covid.

Measurements used to trackoutput per hour were incorrect, heavily skewing the data - which initially suggested Britain had enjoyed the second fastest rise in output per hour, behind Japan.

Britain was elated when initial figures suggested an increase of five per cent between 2020 and 2021, when the nation was under strict pandemic lockdown laws.

In fact, output shrunk by 0.3 per cent in that period, the revised data reveals, which is second only to France's 0.5 per cent contraction as the worst of the rich nations.

The United States, Canada, Germany and Italy each enjoyed rises in productivity.