**Official figures due out later are expected to confirm that the UK exited recession in the final quarter of 2009.**The economy has contracted for a record six consecutive quarters, but signs of recovery have started to emerge.
Last week, it was revealed that unemployment in the UK fell for the first time in 18 months.
The UK is one of the last major economies still in recession. Europe’s two biggest economies - Germany and France - exited recession last summer.
The UK recession began in the April-June quarter of 2008. Since then the economy has contracted by 6%.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) will release the latest gross domestic product (GDP) figures - for the final three months of 2009 - at 0930 GMT.
‘Room for surprises’
Many economists expected the UK to have emerged from recession in the third quarter of 2009, and were taken by surprise by the 0.4% contraction first estimated by the ONS, later revised up to a 0.2% contraction.
First estimates of how the economy has performed are made with only about 40% of the data available.
Investec economist David Page said there was “plenty of room for surprises” in the figures.
“Official GDP estimates have been significantly revised in recent quarters,” he said.
“The last time a first estimate of GDP was left subsequently unrevised was the first quarter of 2007.”
Treasury minister Lord Myners told BBC Radio 4’s PM programme that there were still “some difficult decisions to be made around balancing the economy”.
When asked if recovery can be maintained at a time of huge cuts in public spending, he said: "We have a strategy for growth going forward, as growth will play an important part in reducing the deficit.
“At the same time, we acknowledge that decisions will have to be made about public expenditure.”