In recession.

[Gofer Blue]

In truth, you don't. Just like if a businesses turnover was £1m and the next year it was £999,000 its hardly bad news. The pursuit of endless growth is unrealistic, just as the formal definition of a recession is rather arbitrary and short term.

However, it is a really important measure because it makes all other economic aspirations more difficult to achieve.

It's bad as well as it's a 0.3% deduction, which is unlikely to be graded up.

Several other countries in recession too

Exactly. The BBC especially love to dramatise such non-events. The acid test is always how the FTSE 100 and especially the FTSE 250 react to such news - both have seen modest gains today. If there was a real issue then you would have seen an immediate panicky knee-jerk sell off of £millions worth of stocks and shares.