Fruit is one of the driving factors behind rising inflation, statistics have shown.

The UK consumer price inflation has his 2 per cent in June according to Office for National Statistics (ONS) data, and is the highest CPI figure since 2.1 per cent in May 1998.

Annual retail price inflation, which includes housing costs, stayed at 2.9 per cent.

The largest upward effect on CPI came from food, mainly fruit and meat.

However the figure remains in line with the with the target of 2 per cent set for the Bank of England's monetary policy committee (MPC) by chancellor Gordon Brown.

One economist told the BBC: “It's quite interesting that the main upward effect came from seasonal food prices - that was largely expected.

“What's also potentially interesting is that oil prices, petrol prices, don't appear to have impacted significantly on the June CPI.”

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