Confidence was highest among businesses in the East Midlands, Scotland, London and the northwest, Lloyds said, with most spending directed towards technology and artificial intelligence infrastructure. Amanda Murphy, chief executive of business and commercial banking at Lloyds, said that “while many businesses have already secured funding for investment, a significant proportion have yet to deploy it”. The findings echo a separate Lloyds survey at the end of June, which found that business confidence had dipped over the month amid persistent concerns about inflationary and cost pressures. Andy Burnham, the prime minister, is hoping for an increase in business investment, an area of weakness in the UK economy. The same ONS release put business investment up 0.9 per cent in the first quarter, though still 1.3 per cent below the level recorded in the same quarter a year earlier.