Britain's manufacturing sector suffered an unexpected setback in November as output tumbled 0.7 per cent on the month, official data showed today.
The Office for National Statistics said the drop was the worst since October 2002 and the first fall in production since last August.
The news will come as a disappointment to economists who had looked for a small rise in output on the month in line with improving survey evidence on the sector, which accounts for nearly a fifth of the British economy.
Manufacturing's drop left output a meagre 0.7 per cent higher than a year earlier, also well adrift of analysts' more bullish forecasts.
The ONS data also showed that the fall in output was widespread across the sector. Nine of manufacturing's 13 subsectors showed a fall on the month, with particularly sharp falls seen in electrical and optical equipment, pulp, paper, printing and publishing and food, drink, and tobacco.
Within electrical and optical equipment, computer output fell 6.5 per cent on the month.
On a three-monthly basis, which irons out monthly fluctuations, there was a rise of just 0.1 per cent from the previous three months and an increase of 0.9 per cent on the same period a year earlier.
In the latest three months, there were significant rises in output in the transport equipment and chemicals industries but there was sharp drop in the output of the basic metals industry.
The wider measure of industrial production, which includes North Sea oil and gas output, showed a fall of 1.0 per cent on the month, the worst performance since June 2002 when there was a sharp drop related to the Queen's Golden Jubilee celebrations.
On an annual basis, industrial production was down 0.4 per cent from November last year.