The UK has slipped back into recession after the economy contracted in the first quarter of 2012, an influential think tank warned yesterday.

Gross domestic product (GDP) is on course to have fallen by about 0.1 per cent in the three months to the end of March, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said.

The gloomy forecast comes after official figures revealed the economy contracted by 0.3 per cent in the final quarter of 2011, which was worse than the estimate of a 0.2 per cent fall.

A decline in the first three months of 2012 will mean the UK is officially back in recession, which is defined as two quarters in a row of declines. – (PA)