Why Britain really can't afford to cut civil servants right now

By Paul Whiteley, Professor, Department of Government, University of Essex

A letter leaked to the BBC has revealed that the UK government aims to cut up to 91,000 civil service jobs over the next three years to save money. The letter, sent to civil servants by Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, sets out the aim of reducing staffing levels back to where they were in 2016. Pay and recruitment freezes are also on the table.

This is a bad idea because of a relatively little-noticed development in UK politics which has occurred over the past quarter of a century – the deterioration in…

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