The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK statistics Authority. I have asked the authority to reply.
Letter from Karen Dunnell, dated January 2009:
As National Statistician, I have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question asking what the average change in prices was for (a) beer and (b) wines and spirits on (i) sales and (ii) off sales in real terms in each year since 1987; and what the change in average weekly earnings was between each of those years. (246754)
The table below shows the annual percentage changes for the all items retail prices index and the components for beer and wines and spirits. The beer and wines and spirits data are available from 1988.
Beer Wine and spirits Total RPI Total On sales Off sales Total On sales Off sales 1987 4.2 — — — — — — 1988 4.9 6.1 6.3 4.0 3.6 5.2 2.5 1989 7.8 6.4 6.8 4.2 4.5 5.4 3.7 1990 9.5 10.0 10.4 6.8 9.2 9.8 8.7 1991 5.9 12.8 13.1 10.5 11.8 12.4 11.4 1992 3.7 6.7 7.1 5.0 6.0 6.7 5.4 1993 1.6 5.1 5.4 3.4 3.4 4.6 2.7 1994 2.4 3.1 3.8 -1.3 1.6 3.3 0.6 1995 3.5 4.2 4.4 2.6 3.1 5.0 2.2 1996 2.4 3.5 3.5 3.3 1.9 2.8 1.5 1997 3.1 3.7 3.9 3.0 1.4 3.3 0.3 1998 3.4 4.0 4.4 2.5 2.5 3.9 1.7 1999 1.5 3.2 3.6 1.5 1.7 3.2 0.8 2000 3.0 2.1 2.4 0.9 0.9 2.7 -0.4 2001 1.8 2.3 2.7 0.5 1.8 3.1 0.7 2002 1.7 2.3 2.8 -0.6 2.2 3.6 0.7 2003 2.9 2.2 3.0 -1.8 2.1 3.3 0.3 2004 3.0 2.0 2.9 -2.7 1.9 2.5 0.8 2005 2.8 2.3 3.4 -3.4 1.5 2.5 0.4 2006 3.2 2.9 3.4 -0.3 1.9 3.0 0.6 2007 4.3 3.5 3.9 0.7 2.4 3.4 1.2
Details of percentage change in average earnings over the period 1987 to 2007 are shown in the following table:
Annual averages Annual percentage change 1987 7.7 1988 8.7 1989 9.2 1990 9.8 1991 7.6 1992 5.9 1993 2.9 1994 3.7 1995 3.1 1996 3.6 1997 4.2 1998 5.2 1999 4.8 2000 4.5 2001 4.4 2002 3.5 2003 3.3 2004 4.5 2005 4.0 2006 4.1 2007 4.0