Civil Service grows by 120,000 in 10 years and Reeves only wants to cut 10,000?

Reeves’ cuts will barely touch the sides, in an ever more centralised UK state apparatus

Montage © Facts4EU.Org 2025

Have we become a country increasingly run by central government and bureaucrats?

On Sunday (23 Mar 2025) the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves, was doing the rounds of the TV studios ahead of her eagerly-anticipated Spring Statement (aka Budget) in the House of Commons tomorrow. Within her messages designed to prime the audience for what is to come was her statement that she wants to make cuts across the board and she mentioned cutting 10,000 jobs in the Civil Service.

This exclusive report from the Facts4EU think-tank exposes Ms Reeves aims as being:

Trivial compared to the headcount growth in the Civil Service over the past 10 years, and
An effective confirmation that the UK will continue to be run by a growing, centralised apparatus

Brexit Facts4EU.Org Summary

The 10-year growth in the Civil Service and Government headcounts

(No’s of individuals employed)

1. Civil Service headcount

2015 : 425,000
2024 : 546,000
Increase : 121,000 (28.5%)

2. Central Government headcount

2015 : 3,050,000
2024 : 3,945,000
Increase : 895,000 (29.3%)

3. Local Government headcount

2015 : 2,284,000
2024 : 1,994,000
Decrease : -290,000 (-12.7%)

4. NHS headcount

2015 : 1,551,000
2024 : 2,028,000
Increase : 477,000 (+30.8%)

We badly need your support to continue
Please help us by making a donation below

Any credit card user

Quick One-off

From £5 - £1,000

Monthly

From £3 per month

Paypal Users Only - Choose amount first

Quick One-off

Monthly

Headcounts breaking records… for all the wrong reasons

Employment in central government was a record high in 2024, at an estimated 4.00 million in December 2024, an increase of 105,000 (2.7%) compared with December 2023. The main contributors to this increase were the NHS, some local authority schools becoming academies, and the Civil Service.

Employment in local government was a record low, at an estimated 1.99 million in December 2024, a decrease of 13,000 (0.7%) compared with December 2023; some local authority schools becoming academies contributed to this decrease.

The estimated employment changes between local government and central government because of academy conversions is 34,000 on the year; this conversion is contributing towards the gains and losses in these sectors. This does not come close to explaining the overall transition from local to national government, however.

The NHS employed an estimated record high of 2.05 million people in December 2024, an increase of 48,000 (2.4%) compared with December 2023, and an astonishing 30.8% uplift in 10 years.

The big questions

The first and biggest question must surely be that given all the extra manpower, where are the extra results? Looking at the NHS, can anyone seriously imagine a commercial company increasing its headcount by 31% and not expecting to see a dramatic increase in output, earnings, and profits? Yet unfortunately we have seen declining outcomes in many parts of its overall delivery. Just what are all the extra staff (nearly half a million of them) doing all day?

Another big question that must be asked is what effect it might have on the country’s economy and on our individual economic wellbeing if all these extra people were working in the private sector instead.

Observations

The Facts4EU team still consider themselves fortunate to have been born free in a country that valued freedom, liberty, independence, and the right to live without intrusive state intervention and control.

That was then, when we were born, and this is now. In today’s United Kingdom we wonder if those now being born will feel the same way when they are older? Today’s report clearly shows how we are increasingly being governed from the centre.

This has significant risks attached, as we saw during the Covid epidemic when the state apparatus was able to move so swiftly and so all-invasively to alter our lives beyond recognition. This was accompanied by a sinister clampdown on any questioning of the orthodoxy. At Facts4EU we felt this directly, as our own questioning in our reports (which started before any other media, at the beginning of March 2020) was criticised and we lost many regular readers and donors. Since then our position has been vindicated somewhat as more facts have come to light, but there is still some way to go before the real facts about the consequences of the state’s actions are revealed in full.

Returning to Rachel Reeves and her Spring Statement tomorrow, if her moves do indeed result in a 10,000 reduction in the Civil Service headcount, then this must clearly be welcomed. However, this is but the proverbial drop in the ocean compared to what needs to be done. There can be no justification for the 28.5% increase in Civil Service employee numbers over the past 10 years.

To those Rejoiners who claim the increase is all due to Brexit, we would like to thank them for providing yet another example of their total lack of understanding of… well… almost everything. If we had indeed truly taken back control of our lives from the European Union, then perhaps some increase might have been justified, but we haven’t.

A good example…

We are about to launch another one of our major series of reports, this time on fisheries and the control of our waters. As with so much else we find that activities on our seas continue to be controlled by EU laws which have still not been repealed.

For regular readers we can tell you that we will launch this series as soon as we can persuade the UK’s fisheries authorities to respond to our invitation to present their side of the case. If they decline, or if they insist we follow their bureaucratic procedures, we will publish anyway and let the public make up their own minds, as we always do.

Please, please help us to carry on our vital work in defence of independence, sovereignty, democracy and freedom by donating today. Thank you.

[ Sources: Office for National Statistics, 20 Mar 2025 ] Politicians and journalists can contact us for details, as ever.

Brexit Facts4EU.Org, Tues 25 Mar 2025

Click here to go to our news headlines

Please scroll down to COMMENT on the above article.
And don't forget actually to post your message after you have previewed it!

Something to say about this? Scroll down for reader comments

Since before the EU Referendum, Brexit Facts4EU.Org
has been the most prolific researcher and publisher of Brexit facts in the world.

Supported by MPs, MEPs, & other groups, our work has impact.

We think facts matter. Please donate today, so that we can continue to ensure a clean Brexit is finally delivered.

Any credit card user

Quick One-off

From £5 - £1,000

Monthly

From £3 per month

Paypal Users Only - Choose amount first

Quick One-off

Monthly

PLEASE NOTE IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO COMMENT : You can write your comment under any existing comments below. After you have clicked to preview your comment, you MUST then click on the CAPTCHA system and send you comment, for it to be published. Thank you!

Reader Comments 4

1. Sparky , Tuesday, March 25, 2025, 09:33:

Good piece in the Telegraph on the same subject including criticism by Jacob Reese-Mogg complaining about the increase, the man who was Brexit minister in charge of efficiency.
.
Clearly the increase started after the referendum and as a direct result of Brexit. The additional costs wiping out the fictional £350m pw. Brexit keeps delivering.
.
As for the NHS, clearly in need of increased efficiency and overhaul but part of the reason for the increase is an ageing population (the population that voted for Brexit with dreams of British Empire). In 2022 the UK had 12.7 million people over 65, fifty years ago there were 7.2 million and the current number will continue to grow.

2. LuxuryBalloon , Tuesday, March 25, 2025, 10:41:

Great news … those pesky remoaners predicted an increase in unemployment following Brexit with their Project Fear. By bloating the public sector with additional jobs, this Project Fear prediction did not materialise:

3. Sparky , Tuesday, March 25, 2025, 11:15:

And whilst we’ve had increases in the size of the civil service there has been a massive increase in motobility claimants from 650,000 to 815,000 in the last two years. Maybe this is the Brexit freedoms people voted for?!

4. Northern Muppet , Tuesday, March 25, 2025, 13:48:

What a surprise!!!! Brexit Derangement Syndrome in full flow today!!! :-D
.
This is more evidence that our politicians are merely props for the civil service, who are clearly in charge of this country! They want more staff and a higher population, so that's what we're getting!
.
Drain the Swamp!!!

Add comment:

Please note: Your email address is never published unless you choose to enter it.