Rising rents and banking fees have pushed Britain's annual inflation rate up to 4.4% in July. The rate reported by the Office for National Statistics Tuesday was up from 4.2% recorded in June.
The increase is unlikely to be too much of a surprise, given that the Bank of England's governor Mervyn King recently warned that the rate could rise to over 5% in the coming months in the wake of rising utility bills.
Even though inflation is running at double the Bank of England's target of 2%, rate-setters have refrained from raising borrowing costs given subdued economic growth levels.
The ONS said the upward pressure on prices came from several different factors, but mainly from rising rents, higher fees for financial services like arranging a mortgage, and from volatile bread and cereal prices.
The markets expect the Bank's main interest rate to remain at the record low of 0.5% for many months to come.
