Britain’s ballooning bureaucracy

Like the last Tory administration, this government claims to have economic growth at its heart. Growth was the first of Labour’s ‘five missions to rebuild Britain’ and every few months we get new statements about the latest plan to get growth going. It’s fair to say economic growth has been illusive for both this government and the one that came before it. Not since pre-financial crash days has there been any real consistency or has it run at a level worth writing home about.

But there is one area that, again like its predecessor, this government is delivering growth and that’s in the size of the civil service. The TPA eggheads have crunched the numbers in their latest briefing paper, outlining how the civil service headcount jumped almost 7,000 in the year to March 2025.

Between March 2024 and March 2025, civil service employment increased by 6,820, rising from 542,840 to 549,660, a 1.3 per cent increase. This is the ninth consecutive annual rise. Not only is the headcount going up, so are the salaries. All grades received an inflation busting pay boost, with the median salary for all civil servants rising by almost double the level of inflation from March 2024 to March 2025. Meanwhile, the number of civil servants receiving over £100,000 shot up by 20 per cent!

All told, the total cost of civil service salaries in 2025 is estimated at £21 billion, representing a 7.3 per cent increase from 2024, far outpacing growth of the UK economy during that period.

It wasn’t long before William Yarwood could be found in the GB News studio with Martin Daubney explaining what it all means for taxpayers: “It’s absolutely crazy. To put that £21 billion in context, that is the lifetime tax contribution of 16,000 households gone in one fell swoop… The civil service grows year on year. Are we seeing returns on it? I don’t think we are.”

With William hitting the airwaves, online the research also caught the attention of parliamentarians with Danny Kruger MP, the man charged with preparing Reform for government, citing our findings and pledging to “sack the slackers and link pay to performance”. You’ll find no complaints from us.

The civil service and the wider public sector has been allowed to grow unchecked for far too long as successive governments have failed to get to grips with our bloated bureaucracy. Shrinking and streamlining the state is long overdue.

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Andrew Rosindell MP: Being Right Wing in 2026

What does it mean to be right wing in 2026? Is Reform the best outlet for the right? How did the Conservatives fail on Chagos and lockdown?

For this week’s episode of a nation of taxpayers, Duncan Barkes is joined by William and Andrew Rosindell MP, the latest-bar-one Tory to Reform defector (at the time of writing that is).

Give the latest episode of a nation of taxpayers a listen on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, or watch on YouTube now.

Fixing MP’s pay

There was a hint of a sensible suggestion from Peter Kyle this week. The business secretary called for MP’s pay to be linked to GDP - very nearly music to our ears. We’ve long said that MP’s pay to be linked to their performance and it’s good to see that idea cutting through to the top tiers of government.

In a thread on X, Elliot Keck explained why, with a few caveats, this is a very good idea. Obviously linking just to GDP is not enough. All that would do is encourage parliament to throw open the borders even wider than they are now - the more people, the higher GDP, the higher the pay for parliamentarians. As Elliot writes, it would be better to “link it to GDP per capita, a measure of the actual prosperity of Brits”. As hardworking families become better off, so do MPs, meaning an actual incentive for them to pursue sound economic policies. Of course, if MP’s pay had gone up by GDP per capita since 2010, their pay would be £81,945 - a full £12,000 lower than it currently is. Maybe that’s why they’ve not done it yet?

Picking up that point in an op-ed for the Spectator, John O’Connell wrote: “That is a brutal figure, but it is also revealing. It reflects not a flaw in the metric, but the cumulative impact of decades of poor decisions made by politicians themselves. Weak productivity growth, high taxes, bloated spending and a failure to reform public services have left Britain poorer than it should be. A GDP-per-capita link would simply force MPs to live with the consequences of their own actions.” Hear, hear!

Wrong priorities

As the row over councils cancelling elections continues, we learnt this week how some authorities who claim to be too short on resources to manage an election are spending their residents’ money.

From £30,000 on asylum seeker mental health in Blackburn to £780,000 on gagging orders in Cheltenham to £250,000 on a “solar carport project” in Crawley, many of these councils clearly have their priorities wrong.

Naturally there was fury in the TPA office when we heard about the spending and I told Telegraph readers: “It is outrageous that democracy-dodging councils are pleading poverty while splurging cash on everything from LED lamps to asylum seeker mental health projects… Councils need to focus on providing core services, starting with the elections that give them their mandate.”

Speaking of elections…

Elliot used his latest op-ed in ConservativeHome this week to question the high spending on elections by thirds and halves in some council areas compared to those who hold all out elections. As our recent research paper showed, if those that elect by thirds or halves had instead had all seats up for grabs in one go, local councils could have saved £25 million between 2021 and 2024.

As Elliot argues: “The data then is completely and utterly unambiguous. The process of breaking up elections over a four year period adds significant costs to local councils and the democratic process… Given the enormous funding pressures bearing down on town halls, that is no small consideration. We shouldn’t be denying democracy, but maybe we should be standardising it.” Have a read of Elliot’s latest article in full here.

Making Tax Difficult

For anyone reading this who submits a self-assessment, you’ll be well aware that yesterday marked the deadline for getting yours sorted. But this annual ritual looks like it’s about to get a whole lot worse thanks to the expansion of Making Tax Digital (MTD) and the upcoming changes are the subject of this week’s blog, guest written by Clive Slater, chartered accountant and business owner.

Running through the radical changes, including quarterly filings and the need for costly accounting software, Clive writes: “The new system will require taxpayers to submit quarterly updates of income and expenditure, followed by an annual End of Period Statement (EOPS) to adjust and correct those submissions, and finally a Final Declaration which effectively replaces the familiar SA100 annual tax return. All of this must be done using HMRC approved digital software for bookkeeping which many taxpayers will find bewildering. To concentrate minds, HMRC will also introduce a new points-based penalty system designed to punish late submissions and non-compliance… Millions of taxpayers will find that a once-a-year chore will be transformed into a rolling administrative treadmill, generating provisional numbers that are frequently inaccurate and never used to calculate the actual tax bill. If quarterly figures do not determine tax liabilities, one is entitled to ask a simple question - what is the point? MTD mistakes technology for reform and leaves untouched a tax system that remains complex, fragmented and barely comprehensible.”

Check out Clive’s must read blog here.

War on Waste

I wrote earlier about an almost smart idea from the business secretary. To keep things balanced, here’s a rubbish one from the Foreign Office. Callum McGoldrick, our investigations guru, has uncovered how taxpayers are footing a £750,000 bill to support small and medium sized businesses in… South Africa.

Yep, as ministers make life harder for people running their own business at home (see the above blog and the (un)Employment Rights Act 2025), they’re lavishing cash to help people with their own businesses more than 8,000 miles away. You couldn’t make it up.

Until next week
Benjamin Elks, grassroots development manager