Yes won comfortably, and its case was one of bloat: a state that voters called too big, too costly and past fixing by trimming. The two most-respected Yes arguments were short, blunt and nearly interchangeable, and they came with little detail.
The most-respected Yes case held that “The bloat of the state is out of control and we can't afford it”. Others went further, one proposing to “take an axe to half of the numbers”. A more careful Yes voice wrote that “Headcount is not the measure of success; outcomes are”, wanting duplication and layers of management stripped out while technical expertise stays. Another pointed to AI for visas and benefits.
The most-respected No cases were sharper than their margin of defeat suggests. One asked, “This is such a bizarre thing to want when you have no idea what they do”. Another tied the growth in headcount to Brexit's new regulatory and border work. Elsewhere No voters held up the US DOGE cuts as a lesson, with “rehiring people” as the cost, and one asked what sharply even means.
The sides disagreed about money. One Yes voter said “A quarter of all spend in the public sector is salaries in Central government”, while a No voter put civil service pay below two per cent of government spending. Even a Yes voter who wanted a smaller force warned that the American cuts were “very stupid”.
So the debate ran between a conviction that the state had swollen and a warning that cuts made blind would have to be undone.
110 Opinions
The bloat of the state is out of control and we can't afford it
The state is too big and too expensive, with too many pointless committees and quangos, and too much bureaucracy
The state is massively over sized. Its eating up heavy amounts of tax, the state should be small able to make decisions sharply... the bigger its gotten the worse its gotten this is a objective fact
Bloated departments with terrible productivity but earning inflated wages. The vast majority wouldnt last two minutes in the private sector where the commercialisation/profit motive expects everyone to be pulling their weight. Like Musk with Twitter, we could probably take an axe to half of the numbers and barely feel the wind in terms of how well or poor it operates
I want small government that does essential things extremely well. Headcount is not the measure of success; outcomes are. Strip out duplicated functions, pointless bureaucracy, excessive consultancy and layers of management. Digitise processes properly, retain the technical expertise government needs and hold leaders accountable for delivery. Cut roles where the work adds no value, not to meet an arbitrary target that leaves taxpayers paying more for worse services.
Well maybe we should ask Emma Reynolds if these people are all ‘workers’? Then she could get rid of those that aren’t- although I think we all know how that would pan out. Cushioned by pensions this area needs someone to cut down the paper shufflers and ensure key areas work efficiently.
I would continue with the program of voluntary redundancy, to thin out the over bloated middle manager strata and well paid Whitehall white collar roles that exploded during Brexit and covid. Although an expensive upfront cost, efficiencies and savings will accrue in X number of financial years.
We used to rule a third of the world, with no computers with far fewer civil servants than we have now.
Yes of course. There is no need for so many. The whole civil service is one huge job creation scheme. Too many that are there appear to be working against our country and its people. If we got rid of half of them I’d bet we wouldn’t notice the difference.
Everybody ought to know the absolute waste of money happening in civil "service". The passport office, for eg, has employees with inflated salaries who have been on roll for 15 years and nothing while contracted, agency workers actually do the jobs, for minimum wage. Reply below with your own example!