UK GDP: The chart that shows how much the UK contributes to global growth

The UK didn’t reach its pre-crisis economic peak until 2013

George Osborne on a visit to the Airbus factory in Filton, Bristol on Thursday January 28 (PA)

George Osborne was the first to celebrate the UK’s economic output growing 0.5 per cent in the last three months of 2015.

“These figures show Britain continues to grow steadily,” he said. “Despite turbulence in the global economy, Britain is pushing ahead.”

But is the UK really "pushing ahead"?

It’s taken longer for the UK to bounce back from the financial crisis than some other countries, Office of National Statistics data shows.

That’s because the UK fell harder than some countries, and took longer to recover.

The UK didn’t reach its pre-crisis economic peak until 2013. But since then, economic growth has been faster.

The latest data shows that the UK has had one of the strongest recoveries of any of the G7 countries.

But UK growth is still a long way behind the biggest global economies: the US and China.

It still contributes only a tiny amount towards total global growth.

Currently the UK contributes 3.94 per cent of global growth, according to a Voronoi diagram created by HowMuch.net that visualises the world’s economic output as a circle.

Meanwhile the US contributes 23.32 per cent and China 13.32 per cent.

The predominance of dark blue on the UK’s spot in the Vonoroi diagram also shows that UK economic output is heavily weighted in favour of services.

The service sector, which includes teaching, banking, transport and media, grew 0.7 per cent in the final quarter of 2015. Manufacturing growth was stagnant and construction even fell into recession.

That’s reason for some analysts to be concerned.

Andrew Goodwin, lead UK economist at Oxford Economics, said that Osborne’s touted revival of UK industry is nowhere to be seen.

“With output flat in Q4, the manufacturing sector finally limped out of recession, but the Chancellor’s much-vaunted “march of the makers” remains conspicuous by its absence,” Goodwin said.

All the more reason for the Chancellor to dig out his hard hat.