Britain unemployment edges higher

Britain's unemployment rate has risen slightly, while soaring inflation is causing the value of wages to fall at the fastest rate in more than a decade, official data showed Tuesday.

Unemployment rose to 3.8 percent in the three months to the end of April, remaining close to a 50-year low, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said in a statement.

That compared with a rate of 3.7 percent in the first quarter of the year.

ONS Head of Economic Statistics, Sam Beckett, noted that "pay in real terms is falling at its fastest rate in over a decade".