Anneliese Dodds – 2020 Comments on ONS Statistics on Economic Growth

The text of the comments made by Anneliese Dodds, the Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, on 14 July 2020.

While it is encouraging to see that the economy started to slowly grow back in May, these figures show the scale of the challenge ahead of us.

Labour pushed the government to do more protect and create jobs. While we have concerns around the implementation of the Kickstart scheme, we are pleased to have seen some action in this area. But ministers must do much more to prevent people becoming unemployed in the first place, such as a flexible Job Retention Scheme for badly-hit sectors and areas affected by additional lockdowns.

Above all, the government must focus on getting the Test, Track and Isolate system working properly, which is vital to help build consumer confidence.