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Hello and welcome to More or Less. We are weekly guide to the numbers all around us in

the news and in life. A packed programme today, as we ask why the Bank of England is struggling

to forecast inflation, and whether Rishi Sunak is likely to keep his promise that it will

halve by the end of the year. We try to figure out how many women will have an abortion over

the course of their lives, whether Scotland is truly a giant of tidal energy,

and whether the NHS was as badly prepared for Covid as the former Chief Medical Officer says,

or as well prepared as the former Chancellor George Osborne says. First, do you remember January

2023? Hi, can I get a flat wipe please? Well, my coffee is being made. Let me tell you what we're

doing to halve inflation. Ah, January, a different time. The sun was setting at half past four,

the DMZ harwi was chairman of the Conservative Party, and Jeremy Hunt was using coffee and

off-the-shelf piano music to explain how his government had a full-proof plan to halve inflation,

as the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak had promised. Time to sit back, sip that coffee, and check in on

the inflation figures five months on. Yes, nearly halfway through the year, inflation

is still a big problem in the UK. Last week's figures were dismayingly and unexpectedly high,

with headline inflation at 8.7%. The Bank of England promptly hiked its interest rate by a chunky

half percentage point to 5%, it's aim to discourage spending and drive inflation down.

Back in January, we at Moralesce were quick to argue the government's pledge to

halve inflation wasn't much of a pledge at all, partly because governments have been

delegating the control of inflation to an independent Bank of England for a quarter of a century,

and mostly because it seemed perfectly predictable that headline inflation would plunge.

Inflation is measured by comparing prices at the current moment to prices 12 months earlier,

...