INSTANT VIEW - April CPI rockets to 3 percent

LONDON, May 13 (Reuters) - Britain's consumer price inflation rate leapt by its biggest amount in nearly 6 years to a full point above the central bank's 2 percent target as food and fuel bills soared.

That put Bank of England Governor Mervyn King a whisker away from having to write to the government explaining how he plans to bring inflation back to target and will likely severely dent expectations of further interest rate cuts.

ANALYST COMMENT

JAMES KNIGHTLEY, ING

"It looks increasingly as though inflation will stay above 3 percent for the rest of this year. This will make near-term policy easing less likely as the BoE fears inflation expectations will rise further, risking second round price effects through higher wages.

"However, the activity backdrop is deteriorating markedly and the CPI report highlighted that clothing and retail footwear have very little pricing power.

"Given the BoE targets inflation on a two year horizon there is scope for further policy easing, but the risk is that this gets delayed further into 2008 and 2009."