The loss of a million public sector working days during last November's strike over pension may have contributed to a shock decline in GDP of 0.2% in the last quarter of 2011.

The official ONS figures are a sharp contrast to the third quarter when GDP expanded by 0.6% and mean that as a result the economy grew by a paltry 0.8% for the whole year. In 2010, still stimulated by pump priming in construction, the economy grew by 1.7%.