Things will get worse for the economy next year before they get any better Britain must brace for zero growth in the first three months of the new year - and the distinct possibility of zero interest rates to boot 24 December 2020 • 6:00am The phrase "Year Zero" has uncomfortable historical connotations. When the Khmer Rouge's murderous regime seized Cambodia in 1975, the aim was to erase the past and rebuild society from the ground up, liquidating all opposition. Going back further still, Maximilien Robespierre tried much the same thing, dating the calendar from the birth of France’s First Republic in 1792. But while comparing the current UK political scene to dangerous revolutionaries seizing a state to the detriment of its people is clearly outlandish, in economic terms the UK is on course for its own Year Zero in 2021.