LONDON, Dec. 17 (Xinhua) -- Britain's consumer price index (CPI) rose by 3.2 percent year-on-year in November 2025, data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed Wednesday. This rate was slower than the increase of 3.6 percent observed in October, the ONS said.

"Inflation fell notably in November to its lowest annual rate since March," ONS chief economist Grant Fitzner said, lower food prices, which traditionally rise at this time of the year, were the main driver of the fall.

Fitzner also noted that the increase in the cost of goods leaving factories slowed driven by lower food inflation, but the annual cost of raw materials for businesses continued to rise.

Kris Hamer, director of insight at the British Retail Consortium, attributed the ease of inflation to the extensive discounting by retailers across the Black Friday month.

"While high labor and commodity costs have pushed up food inflation over 2025, bigger promotions ahead of Christmas helped to bring this figure down," Hamer commented.

Julian Jessop, economics fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs, argued that prices are still rising from already high levels, just at a slightly slower pace. "This is especially true of food prices, where the annual inflation rate was still 4.2 percent," he said.

"The aggressive price discounting in clothing and footwear and in household goods suggests that pre-Budget jitters turned Black Friday into Black November. This is not necessarily healthy, or sustainable," Jessop added. 

Source: Xinhua