Rachel Reeves has denied that Labour is heading towards austerity as she confirmed plans to cut Civil Service running costs by 15%.The Chancellor pointed to money poured into capital spending and the NHS, saying the Government’s actions were a “far cry” from those of their Conservative predecessors.
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00:00We're going to invest in the areas that are our priority.
00:03So, for example, the health secretary, Wes Streeting, has announced
00:06the abolition of NHS England,
00:09and we will reinvest that money in frontline public services.
00:12So we're going to do things differently.
00:14We're going to cut the back office functions,
00:16the administrative and bureaucracy functions.
00:18The size of government increased massively during the Covid pandemic.
00:23That was five years ago, as you've just reported.
00:25But the size of the civil service hasn't come back during that period.
00:29And we now need to make sure that we do realise those efficiency savings
00:34so we can invest in the priorities.
00:35Can you confirm today, then, that government departments are being told
00:38to cut their budgets, their running costs by 15 percent?
00:42Yes, we are, by the end of this parliament, making a commitment
00:45that we will cut the costs of running government by 15 percent.
00:51And I think anyone running a business will think that that is more than possible,
00:55because if you look at the advances in technology and AI,
00:58we're already using it at His Majesty's Revenue and Customs
01:01and the Department for Work and Pensions to tackle fraud and error in the system,
01:05using technology alongside people,
01:08but using more technology to do some of those jobs.
01:11And if we can realise those benefits, it means that we can invest more
01:17in people working in the frontline, whether it's teachers in our schools,
01:19police on our streets or doctors and nurses in our hospitals.
01:23And that's the right thing to do.
01:24There hasn't been a zero-based review of what government spends money on since 2007.
01:30That's 18 years ago. No business would run like that.
01:33So we've asked every department to rank all of their spending
01:36from the most important to the least.
01:38And we want to put more money into the things that are the most important things
01:42for voters, for citizens, and less money on the things
01:46that are just not necessary or we should be doing in a different way.