Britain is heading for national bankruptcy. The national debt is over £3000bn, up almost 10 fold in a generation. In August alone the Government borrowed a further £18.3bn, the worst August figure since COVID, despite record tax rises. The money raised from taxation is going into a black hole for little or no benefit to British people. In fact, we are now largely funding the third world invasion of our shores. It is bent beyond belief. The Government is accumulating £130bn of new debt each year and we are spending over £120bn each year just to service this debt. That is about twice the defence budget, wasted. A millstone around the young’s necks for past profligacy. It shames my generation. Since Labour won in July 2024 they have continued feathering the public sector’s nest. Public sector pay has risen 12.8% since July 2024 compared with private sector increases of 7.8% while inflation is up 7.3%. Public sector worker headline pays now £757 per week against £739 for the private sector. The real gap is far higher due to far more generous pensions, generally longer holidays, higher public sector absentee rates and a job for life culture. This might be fine if the productivity of the public sector was credible. It is not. Obviously. More if we look at employment growth since January 2000 the public sector has taken on a staggering 1,137,000 extra workers while the private sector has been stagnant putting on a mere 231,000 jobs. When one considers the UK population was estimated at 67.1 million in 2020 against 69.3 million today the private sector is in clear and obvious recession. This recession is entirely the Government’s fault by engineering very high energy prices while increasing tax and regulation. A recipe for disaster, to say the very least. For this extra million plus workers in the public sector one might have expected fantastic service. Do you believe that’s the case? I certainly don’t. ONS data suggests shows that public sector productivity has risen a whopping 1.8% since 1997. 1997 is the very dawn of the internet, pre AI and digital technology - this is a staggeringly inept performance and lags UK economy wide productivity gains averaging 32%. If one excludes debt interest payments and welfare payments HMG spends c£850bn. A 31% productivity gap since equates to c£230bn of lost opportunity. The mystery of the UK’s abysmal economic performance is no mystery at all. It comes down clearly and simply as a result of the private sector being crushed and crowded out under the weight of gross public sector inefficiency. I detest it. A generation ago Britain was split roughly two thirds private and one third public, today it is close to 50-50. Through massive regulation, high taxation, welfarism and excess debt we have swapped a productive private sector led economy for an incompetent and failing public sector one. Britain spends £45,000 for every family in the land on a public sector which is clearly not fit for purpose. The radical change needed to restore Britain is possibly more than the average voter will accept. But it’s the only way, and Restore Britain will continue to make that difficult argument. I am hopeful that voters will appreciate the honesty for a change. Because many, many, many awful decisions lay ahead. They need to be taken.