THE UK manufacturing sector has experienced one of its weakest quarters during the past two years, with its performance remaining lacklustre in September, a key survey has shown.
The Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply's latest purchasing managers' index for manufacturing, a composite measure of activity in the sector, fell from 51.6 in August to 51.5 in September on a seasonally-adjusted basis.
While remaining above the level of 50 deemed to separate expansion from contraction, the index continued to signal only very modest growth.
The survey is further evidence of the extent to which Chancellor George Osborne's March 2011 Budget vision of "a Britain carried aloft by the march of the makers" has failed to materialise.
CIPS's survey also showed a marginal decline in the UK manufacturing workforce in September.
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