In the seven days since you (hopefully) read our last weekly bulletin, the country has added almost £2.7 billion to the national debt. We won’t be offended if you can’t bring yourself to watch it tick up yourself, but I’m afraid we’re going to be sending you regular reminders. If you fancy ruining the rest of your Sunday, do feel free to take a look.

For a lot of people though, the debt clock is just a number, or rather lots of numbers, on a screen. What does it actually mean in practice for taxpayers? Probably the most immediate impact is the cost to the Treasury of servicing the debt, i.e. paying the interest. One of our research whizz-kids had the idea of looking at how much interest we pay on the debt every year and seeing what it could pay for instead.

We almost rather he didn’t. In research published in the Express, it turned out that the £102 billion spent on debt interest would pay for all Labour’s spending pledges, or the abolition of about a dozen taxes. As Shimeon pointed out, “the choices made today will impact governments of tomorrow.” Check out the research here.

Of course it’s all very well complaining about the debt, but what are the actual solutions? Well the TPA has never shied away from offering ideas, however difficult they may be. With perfect timing our research team produced an extraordinary report into the generosity of public sector pension schemes that was covered in The Telegraph. Turns out that public sector workers can expect to retire on a pension of almost four times the size of those in the private sector.

Our findings certainly ruffled some feathers. Former editor of The Sun newspaper, Kelvin MacKenzie seethed in an op-ed that if the chancellor really wanted to balance the books, “she would freeze the gold-plated pensions of state employees.”

Ever since our revelations on the number of civil servants hit two front pages last summer, our researchers have been keeping a close eye for the latest data. When that data duly dropped they were quick out of the traps to identify the key trends.

In what was their third research paper in just one week, they made some truly shocking discoveries. Turns out that the civil service added 23,060 new pen-pushers to its ranks, more than double the increase of the previous year. In addition, all grades enjoyed inflation-busting pay rises. But the really shocking finding, which made its way onto the front page of The Telegraph, was that the number with salaries over £100,000 soared to 2,915. With Labour ditching plans to cut the number of civil servants, our research couldn’t have been more timely. 

John spoke for taxpayers everywhere, telling anyone in government who will listen that it should be “radically transforming our bureaucracy towards one focused on key services.” Needless to say, our research team deserve a relaxing Sunday after their week dominating the agenda.

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A pattern of waste

Rachel Reeves seemed to be on the right page when she declared that public bodies need to crack down on waste. But where is the spare change she is searching for going? Unfortunately it’s going to new quangos and boosts to public sector pay, not back into the pockets of taxpayers.

Joanna couldn’t have put it better when she told The Sun: “Taxpayers will be flabbergasted by the scale of waste in the public sector. It's no wonder ministers haven't got any cash left, but they should remember that it is Brits who will suffer."

Will they ever crack down on fraud?

It’s never a dull week at TPA towers, and regular readers I’m sure will be delighted to find out that this week I made my broadcast debut, chatting to the legendary Mike Graham about the pressing topic of benefit fraud. 

As I explained to Talk listeners “this commitment is certainly welcome, but this comes two weeks after the DWP essentially waved the white flag on this issue and said they expect fraud to go up every single year.”

Robbing Peter to pay Paul

It was a week when the TPA really dominated the news agenda. Analysis we shared with the good folks at the Telegraph revealed that taxpayers in England are having to foot the bill for free prescriptions in Wales and Scotland. The majority of people in England have to pay for their prescriptions, which are rising in price year on year. 

John didn't hold back: “This clearly shows that the Scottish government is happy to milk British taxpayers to pay for freebies, from prescriptions to university fees.The new Labour government should look at trimming the Scotland subsidy as one of its options for repairing the public finances.”

Why raising capital gains tax is a lose, lose

There’s lots of talk about which taxes the chancellor will raise to plug the hole in the finances, or pay for her many spending plans, depending on your point of view. One we hear a lot about is capital gains tax. In this week’s blog, TPA researcher, Jonathan Eida, decided to dig into whether this is really the solution Reeves might hope

Having reviewed the numbers, Jonathan has discovered that this could actually lose the Treasury money. As he explains: “Capital gains are the purest result of investment transitions. To increase taxes on capital gains is to directly disincentivise investment. It will directly impact the UK’s economic standing, and not in a positive way.”

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