On the BBC’s Question Time, at around 56 minutes into the recording, Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said: “The economy is growing much more strongly than it did under the Conservatives.”

This depends on what time period is used to make the comparison. Gross domestic product (GDP) was growing very slowly in the period just before Labour came to power. So if comparing that with Labour’s record then Mr Reynolds is right.

However, Labour’s record to date is worse than the Conservatives if comparing it with the entire period the Tories were in charge from 2010 to 2024, even when including the pandemic.

The facts

GDP grew by just 0.3% in 2023, the last full year that the Conservative Party was in charge. In 2025 – the first full year of the current Labour government – GDP grew by 1.3%.

However, apart from 2020 when the country went through pandemic lockdowns, 2023 was the worst year for GDP growth in the Conservatives’ period in charge.

The party came to power in May 2010 as part of a coalition with the Liberal Democrats. It remained in power until the July 2024 general election.

This means there were 13 full calendar years when the Conservative Party was in power in the UK. In the early 2020s GDP was heavily impacted by the pandemic, seeing a double-digit contraction in 2020 followed by very high growth in the following two years.

If looking at the whole period between 2010 and 2025, then annual GDP growth in 2025 was the joint 11th lowest out of 16 years.

If instead comparing 2025 to the period from 2011 to 2019 – to strip out years impacted by the pandemic and include only years in which the Conservatives were fully in charge – then growth in 2025 was equal to 2019. Growth in 2019 was the second lowest in the 2011 to 2019 period.

In the period from 2011 to 2023, average annual GDP growth was 1.6%, compared with 1.3% for 2025.

There has only been one full year in which Labour has been in charge, meaning it is difficult to compare with prior years.

Looking at quarterly GDP growth instead provides a few more data points.

Analysis of quarterly growth shows that in the 56 full quarters that the Conservatives were in charge, quarterly GDP grew by an average of 0.5%. So far during the eight quarters of Labour’s term, average GDP growth has been 0.3%.

But comparing the economy under Labour with the economy just before Labour took over shows improvements in the short-term trend.

In the last eight quarters of the Conservatives being in power, GDP growth averaged just 0.2%. This covers the period from July 2022 – a few months after a majority of the pandemic-era restrictions had been lifted – to July 2024.

ONS – Gross Domestic Product: Year on Year growth: CVM SA % (archived)

ONS – Gross Domestic Product: Quarter on Quarter growth: CVM SA % (archived)

ONS – How people spent their time after coronavirus restrictions were lifted, UK: March 2022 (archived)

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