Rachel, why is your precious public sector growing 3 TIMES as fast as the private sector?

Is this why you made so many of us poorer in your Budget yesterday?

Montage © Facts4EU.Org 2025

If ever there was a time to impose a public sector recruitment freeze, this was it

Yesterday in her Budget Statement, Rachel Reeves spent a significant time talking about her investment in the public sector. As this comes at considerable cost, Facts4EU think-tank has analysed the latest figures released by the Office for National Statistics only a few weeks ago, showing the breakdown of public sector and private sector employment.

The results of our research clearly show that the fastest-growing sector between public and private sectors is the public sector. We went back to the latest comparable figures for Great Britain (Northern Ireland has not reported yet) and found that public sector employment has been growing more than three times faster than employment in the private sector.

Given the public sector relies on the private sector to pay its wages, this research goes some way to showing why the Chancellor was forced to increase the tax burden yet again, despite her promises not to.

830,000 new workers in the public sector - a rise of 16% in nine years

Today we reveal how the public sector has increased its employment by an astonishing 830,000 since 2016 - the last year for which comparable data is available. We also look at what all these new employees are doing.

Brexit Facts4EU.Org Summary

Analysis of the public sector, 2024

1. The private/public sector split, 2024

The overall split between private and public sector employees is shown below. The proportion of public sector workers has been increasing, as we we show further down.

2. The growth rates of employees in the private sector versus the public sector

One of the stand-out facts from our analysis is the highly significant difference between the growth in numbers of employees in the last nine years, when comparing the private sector to the public sector.

The majority of new employees are employed in the private sector. That said, the growth rate in the public sector is now more than three times that of the private sector. The overall proportion of private to public has been changing - in a negative direction.

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Brexit Facts4EU.Org Summary

Analysis of the public sector, 2024 - Continued

3. Total numbers and functional areas of public sector workers, 2024

Health 2,147,600
Education 1,610,100
Public Administration 1,516,600
Transport & Storage (inc Postal) 145,800
Business Administration and Support Services 103,200
Other 102,400
Professional, Scientific & Technical 70,000
Finance & Insurance 51,800
Construction 38,700
Mining, Quarrying & Utilities 36,700
Information & Communication 29,800
Manufacturing 24,900
Property 20,100
Accommodation & Food Services 13,400
Agriculture, Forestry & Fishing 2,800
Motor Trades 2,500
Wholesale 2,100
Retail 1,900

TOTAL : 5,920,400

[Source: ONS BRES survey Nov 2025.]

5. NEW public sector workers since 2016 by functional sector – breakdown of the increases

Health 346,100
Education 119,000
Public Administration 273,700
Transport & Storage (inc Postal) 48,400
Professional, Scientific & Technical 33,200
Manufacturing -6,600
Retail 17,700
Property -7,100
Wholesale 7,000
Accommodation & Food Services 3,400
Motor Trades 1,400
Finance & Insurance 5,800
Other -1,400
Construction -4,200
Agriculture, Forestry & Fishing -1,000
Information & Communication 300
Business Admin & Support Services -500
Mining, Quarrying & Utilities -500
TOTAL 834,700

TOTAL : 834,700

[Source: ONS BRES survey Nov 2025.]

Observations

Following Ms Reeves's discourse on public investment yesterday, the Facts4EU.Org team dived into the latest, raw, official data that lay behind the report released by the Office for National Statistics. It is only by analysis like this that we are able to bring readers some insights which are simply not available in the mainstream media.

In this case we discovered an interesting trend. The increase in the number of public sector employees in the last nine years is more than three times that of the increase in private sector employees. This trend seems to be continuing.

We were also able to look in some detail at this increase in the public sector, and it is clear that the bulk of it comes from health, education, and 'public administration'. At a time when the Chancellor was forced to break the spirit of her promise not to raise taxes again, she has done just that. This was the perfect time to announce a freeze on public sector recruitment, in the same way she froze various tax thresholds. Unfortunately she chose instead to keep on her current path.

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[ Sources: Office for National Statistics, BRES survey ] Politicians and journalists can contact us for details, as ever.

Brexit Facts4EU.Org, Thurs 27 Nov 2025

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Reader Comments 4

1. Ashley Great Britain , Thursday, November 27, 2025, 07:36:

And 50% of that public sector will be high pay and very low productivity. There will be so many of them managing to swan through their working day doing very little.
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Wait for sparky to say its all because of Brexit.
With health it's because everybody left and with immigration it's because everyone arrived.

2. Sparky , Thursday, November 27, 2025, 09:58:

1 AGB. Surprise!
.
Wait for it!
.
I agree with you!!! (Your first paragraph)
.
Interesting research. It would be interesting to see this going back to 2008 and the beginning of austerity, was there a reduction before 2016.
.
As for your second paragraph and Brexit, it is inevitable that there would be an increase in public sector due to Brexit. Border Force, Vets, Administration etc. Also the same case with the Private sector (remember cutting red tape?) but the additional admin etc is more likely to be absorbed in the Private sector. However that would not cover Health and Education which make up the largest sectors of increase shown above. The number of foreign workers in the NHS and care sector has increased markedly. The increase in Health numbers is likely related to our aging population which is going to be increasing issue over the next decade or so due to the maturing of the Baby-boomers.

3. Sparky , Thursday, November 27, 2025, 10:43:

1 AGB. The increase in the public sector is included in GDP figures, but as you’ve highlighted, at low levels of productivity. An increase in overall GDP but decreasing GDP per capita.

4. NH , Thursday, November 27, 2025, 11:27:

2. Sparky "it is inevitable that there would be an increase in public sector due to Brexit"
.
It's inevitable that the main departments would need to increase in size to cope with immigration. There are approx. 6 million EU nationals in the UK all who require health services, education and administration, all free of charge of course. Many also need very expensive translation services. The fact that we never received the promised Brexit is not a problem with Brexit and we can change policies by voting for new politicians, which we could not do when we were in the EU.
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Areas such as Border Force employ less than 0.2% of the public sector. If we were to return to free movement you have no idea how many EU nationals would come to the UK or what the cost would be. As the EU is keen to fast-track nine more "low income" countries into the EU it could be huge. As previously stated we have a very large number of UK trained new medical staff trying to find work in the UK.
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If you want a sensible solution vote for a political party that will control immigration, access to welfare benefits and public sector productivity.

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