(Photo: Bloomberg)

The rate in September was 3.1%, higher than the government’s 2%, which increases the chance of a December interest rate rise.

Grant Fitzner, chief economist at the ONS, said the highest inflation rate in almost a decade was driven by higher prices in restaurants and hotels and a rise in the cost of second-hand cars and fuel, with the new car sector still crippled by semiconductor shortages and global supply chain bottlenecks. Soaring input prices is another contributor to rising inflation in the UK, said Fitzner.