LONDON, July 20 (Xinhua) -- Despite gloomy comments made by many, the British economy in the long term is in good shape, and a timetable for its recovery hinges on government policies, a British economist has told Xinhua.

"The British economy is in quite good shape, actually," noted Patrick Minford, a macroeconomist holding the chair of Applied Economics at Cardiff University, during a recent interview with Xinhua.

Britain's Consumer Prices Index rose by 9.1 percent in May, and the Bank of England expected inflation to rise above 11 percent in October alongside a widely anticipated huge increase in the energy price cap.

On inflation, Minford said negative commentaries were many, but "that's very largely due to some very severe supply shocks which have hit the energy and commodity markets coming from COVID and the supply side disruption that's caused."

While the Ukraine crisis has had a terrible effect on commodity prices, the professor added, "one has to remember that these will be reversed and are already starting to be reversed in the markets by the unblocking of supply chains and ports and so forth."

Meanwhile, after the Bank of England ran a hot monetary policy in the context of COVID-19, and "in retrospect it looks as if it's quite a lot too hot," now it is cooling it off, he noted.

Data earlier this month showed the British economy returned to growth in May after a decline in April, but many analysts said it was too early to rule out the possibility of a recession as the persistently high inflation kept choking households and businesses.

Nevertheless, Minford said demand in Britain is still strong as consumers have savings they built up during COVID-19, and that some figures for the first quarter, for example a 0.8-percent rise in the gross domestic product, are quite strong, in sharp contrast with gloomy economic forecasts.

Minford also noted the benefits brought by Brexit. "The EU (European Union) has been quite awkward in terms of paperwork, so a lot of particularly smaller companies have found it quite difficult to keep going in their EU trade," he said.

After Brexit, Britain has tried to make trade agreements with some other countries. If more deals are reached, Minford said, "the prices of goods from the rest of the world are going to fall, and we're going to be integrated into the world economy instead of into the EU economy."

"All of these problems with the EU will be much less important because we will be trading much more widely with the rest of the world at world prices. So that's an important aspect of the whole thing in securing a better future," he added.

Minford said the EU economy will become less important to Britain, with the rest of the world to rise in importance. "But all this will take time, and so clearly we've still got some bumps in the road," he said.

With regard to how long it might take for Britain to recover, the economist said much depends on the policies, especially amid the ongoing Conservative leadership election where many candidates have pledged tax cuts.

As government policies now support higher corporation taxes and National Insurance contributions, he considered them bad for supply side for pushing up wages and wage costs, and thus having a negative effect on growth.

"It's going to be important that the new Prime Minister gets behind the idea that taxes are kept down and doesn't get frightened by the idea of doing a bit more borrowing," he said.

"A few more billions to stop policy going into very negative effects on the supply side would be no problem at all, really, from the modest borrowing involved," he added.