The state grows like Japanese knotweed

WHATEVER his many shortcomings as Chancellor, George Osborne got one thing right. To his great credit, he made steady progress slimming down the bloated bureaucracy and rebalancing the economy to give wealth-creating firms a chance.

True, he should have cut more swiftly when he had voters’ full support after the shock of the financial crisis. But he left a leaner state, with private businesses creating four jobs for every one shed from the public payroll.

So how depressing that figures unearthed by the Mail show the number of civil servants rising sharply for the first time in seven years.

Across Whitehall, there are now 390,000 officials – up 2 per cent on last year. The biggest growth (surprise, surprise!) was at the foreign aid department, where numbers have swollen by 39 per cent since 2010.

Meanwhile, figures this week show public sector workers still earn nearly £70 a week more than their counterparts in private business. That’s even before their goldplated pensions are taken into account. So much for the shroud-waving unions who demand an end to state pay restraint.

The truth is that the public sector is like Japanese knotweed. Cut it back, and it will spring up again at the first opportunity.

If Britain is to flourish after Brexit, it’s vital that the burden of the state is reduced. Chancellor Philip Hammond, take note.