AT the heart of this election lies a fundamental contradiction about the British state. On the one hand, Government spending and therefore the burden of taxation have never been higher. On the other hand, despite these record budgets, our public services have never seemed so badly run or less able to fulfil their essential functions.
So voters feel they are constantly forking out more but receiving less in return. Nothing in the civic realm seems to work properly any more, from the rail network to the ambulance service. Crimes are neglected by the police , sewage is pumped into our rivers, potholes go unrepaired in our roads, social care is mired in permanent crisis and pupil absences are soaring in our secondary schools.
We live in a land where employers complain bitterly about skill shortages despite half of all our young people going to university; where the NHS waiting list rose in April to a record 7.57million, even though spending on the health service got a substantial increase of £3.3billion in 2023/24 and again in 2024/25; and where we have record numbers of qualified lawyers yet the backlog of cases at the crown courts reached 65,000 last June, up from 41,000 in March 2020.
It is no wonder that public faith in justice is collapsing when, last year, the average time to complete a crown court case hit 382 days. The paradox of breakdown amid record cash sums has given a surreal quality to the election debate about the public sector. While the country is crying out for.
