Economy on the up but investment still too low - EEF

While the chancellor argued that there were "tentative signs of a balanced, broad based and sustainable recovery" and suggested that the Labour Party had lost the economic argument, the manufacturers' organisation EEF bemoaned a lack of overall strategy while the CBI urged "stronger levels of business investment and trade to rebalance the economy, so we must get behind smaller firms who are ambitious to export." While agreeing that business surveys suggested the outlook was improving and that the chancellor was right to stress the scale of the challenge, EEF director of policy Steve Radley said that business investment was still down by 25% and manufacturing by 10% on where they were before the recession. He continued: "Though the government has done more in the past 12 months to promote growth, we need to make sure that having turned the corner we don't lose our way on the path to a better balanced economy. We still lack the overall strategy that will clearly set the direction for all government departments to follow and, one which will send out a clear signal to potential investors."