Whitehall ‘blob’ explodes as taxpayers pay for ‘Left-wing apparatchiks | Politics | News
Critics say Andy Burnham will ‘inherit a Whitehall full of Starmer’s apparatchiks’ (Image: Sean Hansford | Manchester Evening News)
Labor has been accused of filling a “bloated” Whitehall with too many “Left-wing apparatchiks” at taxpayers’ expense and rewarding failure as voters make a damning verdict on Sir Keir Starmer’s tenure as prime minister. There is anger Labor has failed to grasp the “ballooning welfare bill” but allowed the cost of pay for special advisers to soar from £6.9 million in 2019-20 to £12.4 million in the last financial year under Boris Johnson.
Andy Burnham will take the reins of a Government in which the number of so-called rowers has jumped from 102 to 155 full-time equivalents in the period. Meanwhile, the size of the Civil Service increased from 423,770 to 523,635. The highest-paid members of Sir Keir’s army of politically appointed advisers earned up to £159,999.
Shadow Cabinet Office minister Mike Wood said Mr Burnham was “about to inherit a Whitehall full of Starmer’s apparatchiks” where aides were “being rewarded for the failure of this Government”.
He said: “Despite this bloated political operation, Labor has failed to grasp the biggest problems facing our country. Not least our ballooning welfare bill.”
Total welfare spending was £314.9bn in 2024-25 and is expected to reach £408.6bn in 2030-31.
Conservative MP Jack Rankin said taxpayers were “footing the bill for an untouchable Whitehall bloc while facing another tax hit”.
Anger emerged against Labor as voters made a shocking assessment of Sir Keir’s record as prime minister. Pollsters’ Opinium found nearly seven in 10 Britons (69%) believe their Government is not successful; only one in five (21%) think it has been successful.
Danny Kruger (right) says Labor ‘not serious about tackling our biggest challenges’ (Image: Getty Images)
Alex Burghart, Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and a close ally of Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, has pledged to cut Civil Service numbers by around 132,000.
He told the Sunday Express: “The next Conservative Government will save £8bn by returning the Civil Service to 2016 staffing levels. We will use this money to cut high street business rates and eliminate stamp duty on the family home instead.”
The government is under pressure to cut welfare spending and rebuild Britain’s armed forces, but Sir Keir’s attempt to restrict entitlement to benefits last year was derailed by a backroom riot – and there are doubts Mr Burnham will achieve further success.
Danny Kruger, who drafted Reform UK’s Government plans, doesn’t think Labor’s Whitehall appointees will cut the bill.
He said: “Whitehall is already full of Leftist apparatchiks. Labour’s inability to grasp the bloated, self-serving civil service or the spiraling welfare bill means they are not serious about tackling the biggest challenges facing our country. Andy Burnham’s failure to even recognize this problem guarantees years of deck chair shuffling. Whitehall needs real reform and Burnham will never deliver it.”
Opinium’s poll revealed deep unease about Mr Burnham’s financial plans. More than one in three Britons (35%) think their decisions on tax rises and spending cuts would be unfair; only 24% think they will be fair.
The vote will make painful reading for Sir Keir as he leaves Downing Street. Two in five voters (41%) say their government is worse than Rishi Sunak’s Conservative administration, while only 25% say it is better.
Labor distrusts civil servants, Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg suggests (Image: Amer Ghazzal/REX/Shutterstock)
Former Leader of the House of Commons Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg said Labour’s reliance on private advisers showed that although the party was “in the hands of the Civil Service unions” it “didn’t trust them to run the country, so it used dozens of expensive shovels”.
William Yarwood of the Taxpayers’ Alliance predicted that the public would be “furious to see Labor stacking up an already bloated Whitehall”, adding: “Britain is crying out for a leaner state, not another empire of advisers, insiders and Leftist civil servants”.
He said: “Burnham should make the trickle smaller rather than surround himself with more of the same people who are failing to deal with the country’s biggest problems.”
John Longworth, of the Independent Business Network, which represents family businesses, asked: “What are they doing other than counting gold-plated pension funds? If Burnham is to have any chance of success, he must start by cutting the public sector and welfare.”
A Government spokesman said: “Special advisers play a critical role in providing advice and support to the Prime Minister and other Government ministers. The appointment of special advisers reflects the extent of the Government’s ambition to serve the public and lead the Civil Service and all parts of Government.”
Callum Price, of the Institute of Economic Affairs, warned of the dangers of “ballooning national debt and hardening economic growth”.
He said: “It remains to be seen whether the new administration will have the right plan to solve these problems, or whether it will face the same obstacles as the last, such as not being able to cut the welfare bill or not being able to back up its words with real action to get the economy moving again.”
