UK manufacturing growth slowed last month, as cost pressures intensified and factory gate prices surged, a survey has revealed.

The inflationary pressures evident in the survey, published yesterday by the Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply, fuelled expectations that the Bank of England could on November 2 implement the first rise in UK base rates for more than a decade. Base rates were cut in August 2016 to a record low of 0.25 per cent.

CIPS’s seasonally-adjusted purchasing managers’ index for UK manufacturing, which measures changes in output, new orders, employment, suppliers’ delivery times and stocks of goods purchased and has painted a stronger picture of the sector than official data recently, fell from 56.7 in August to 55.9 in September to signal slower growth.

The rate of increase of new orders and incoming export business also slowed. CIPS said growth of new export orders was nevertheless among the best recorded over the past six-and-a-half years.

Input price inflation in the sector accelerated in September to the fastest pace in six months.

Nearly 36 per cent of respondents reported a rise in costs, with increasing commodity prices, higher transport costs, the impact of the sterling exchange rate, supply-chain constraints and raw material shortages cited.

Factory gate price inflation accelerated to its fastest pace since May.

Howard Archer, chief economic adviser to the EY ITEM Club think-tank, said: “Expectations that the Bank of England could very well raise interest rates as soon as November will likely be fuelled by the survey showing increased price pressures.”