Claim: Deputy Director General of the Commission for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET), Ing. Peter Antwi Bosaiko, claims the United Kingdom’s (UK) inflation rate is 12%.
Completely false. According to the National Statistics Institute, which is the UK’s largest independent producer of official statistics, the current inflation rate is 9.9%, not 12%.
Full Text
The Deputy Director General of the Commission for Technical and Vocational Education and Training, Ing. Peter Antwi Bosaiko, has claimed that the United Kingdom’s (UK) inflation rate is 12%.
He said this on Neat FM’s Me Man Nti Show. According to him, “Ghana is not the only country where the economy is struggling. The UK’s inflation has always been hovering around 1.1%. As I speak to you, the UK’s inflation is about 12%.”
The shorter version of the show was posted on Tuesday, September 13, 2022, on its mother YouTube channel, Despite media, which has over 270, 000 subscribers. The shorter video has amassed over 70 views so far. The claim was made from the 7 minutes 10 seconds – 7 minutes: 33 seconds.
DUBAWA decided to check the veracity of the claim by taking into consideration Ghana’s comparison with other countries struggling to stabilize their economy.
Verification
The rate of increase in prices over a given period is how the International Monetary Fund (IMF) defines inflation. It can occur when prices rise due to increases in production costs, such as raw materials and wages.
Since the claim was specifically directed at the United Kingdom, DUBAWA decided to focus on official statistics from the country. The National Statistics Institute is the UK’s largest independent producer of official statistics and a recognized national statistical institute in the UK.
According to the data on the recent Consumer Price Inflation released on Wednesday, September 14, 2022, the UK’s inflation rate currently stands at 9.9%. The 9.9% inflation rate is the first drop since August 2021.
The highest since August 2021 to date was in July 2022 which stood at 10.1%.
According to the bulletin, “the largest upward contributions to the annual CPIH inflation rate in August 2022 came from housing and household services (principally from electricity, gas and other fuels, and owner occupiers’ housing costs), transport (principally motor fuels), and food and non-alcoholic beverages.
It also noted that “a fall in the price of motor fuels made the largest downward contribution to the change in both the CPIH and CPI annual inflation rates between July and August 2022. However, rising food prices made the largest, partially offsetting, upward contribution to the change in the rates”.
Conclusion
To sum it up, the claim by the Deputy Director General of the Commission for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET), Ing. Peter Antwi Bosaiko, that the inflation rate in the United Kingdom (UK) stands at 12% is completely false. It is 9.9%.
