Britain’s ‘crumbling’ public services face never-ending crisis, warns think tank

NHS, schools, courts and prisons face ‘doom loop’ on current spending plans, says Institute for Government

Britain’s public services are now “crumbling” and face a state of “perpetual” crisis, according to a stark warning from the nation’s leading government think tank.

The Institute for Government (IfG) said the UK’s “dire” public services were performing worse than they did before Covid – and much worse than when the Conservatives came to power in 2010.

In a bleak assessment, the respected think tank pointed to funding cuts during austerity and the disruption caused by recent strikes as being behind the worsening state of the NHS, schools, courts and prisons.

The think tank also warned that current spending plans – which Labour has said it will stick to if it wins the next election – mean some services are likely to deteriorate further.

Calling for more long-term planning, the IfG said: “In the absence of serious action to improve public service productivity, the government risks getting stuck in a ‘doom loop’, with the perpetual state of crisis burning out staff and preventing services from taking the best long-term decisions.”

The think tank warned: “Escaping this will not be easy and whoever forms the next government will be hindered by the short-sighted decisions of its predecessors.”

The IfG’s grim report covered several public services including hospitals, GPs, the police, courts, prisons, adult social care, schools and children’s social care.

According to the IfG, the crown court backlog was a record 64,709 cases in June 2023, although the greater complexity of the cases meant the “effective backlog” was around 89,937 cases.

The hospital elective waiting list has risen to 7.8 million, compared with 4.6 million on the eve of the pandemic – while only just over half of those attending A&E are admitted, transferred or discharged within four hours.

Striking teachers have complained about classroom funding as well as pay (PA)

The report said the refusal by Rishi Sunak’s government to negotiate on public sector pay for months had extended the duration of strikes and brought more disruption.

Other services such as adult social care have seen additional funding eaten up by higher costs – which the IfG said meant there had been “little progress in reducing unmet and under-met need”.

The think tank added that there was “no meaningful fat to trim” after more than a decade of austerity, and further cuts would damage service performance even more.

Quoting former cabinet secretary Lord O’Donnell, the report concluded that the current government spending plans were “totally unsustainable”.

It said the next government would “likely face huge public and political pressure to provide public services with more generous funding settlements”.

Nick Davies, IfG programme director and report author, said: “Public services are in a dire state and will likely deteriorate further if whoever forms the next government sticks to current spending plans.

“Improvements are possible but difficult decisions will be necessary to break out of the negative cycle of short-termism that has characterised government decision-making, particularly in recent years.”

Labour’s shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves has repeatedly stressed she is committed to “fiscal discipline”.

She has insisted that her own fiscal rules – that UK debt must be falling as a proportion of national income after five years – are “non-negotiable”.

Sir Keir Starmer attempted to inject hope by vowing to “heal” Britain during his Labour conference speech – but he has warned that a Labour government will not open the “big government chequebook” to repair public services.