Massive rise in civil servants – and, yes, there are 40% more foreign aid staff

The number of civil servants has risen substantially for the first time since 2010, with the bloated foreign aid ministry leading the way.

Despite all the promises of cuts, four departments are larger than when the Tories took office.

The surge in bureaucrats is led by the Department for International Development (DfID) which has almost 39 per cent more staff than seven years ago.

While there were 1,600 civil servants at the ministry in the summer of 2010, there are now 2,220. This is the largest increase across all departments.

In a sign that austerity is coming to an end, latest figures show that across Whitehall there are more than 390,000 officials, up 2 per cent over the past year.

The Institute for Government think tank, which has analysed the official statistics, say staff numbers have increased for four quarters in a row for the first time since at least 2010.

An extra 2,950 civil servants were taken on in the three months to the end of June, a period when the number of officials went up at all but three ministries across government. The IfG said much of the increase was down to the demands of Brexit, but added that increasing strains on public services were also forcing departments to take on extra staff.

The number of staff working at DfID has soared since David Cameron decided to increase the foreign aid budget massively. They are needed to dole out the £13billion a year we now spend in foreign aid since the decision to spend 0.7 per cent of national income on it.

James Price, campaign manager at the Taxpayers’ Alliance, said: ‘Whilst it is understandable that Brexit will warrant staff increases, it is not at all clear that more civil servants are the answer to much else. Taxpayers expect a lean and efficient civil service, and will feel reassured that those departments which have cut jobs are serious about saving money.

‘We cannot go back to the days where the answer to every problem was automatically assumed to be “more government”. The largest increase was unsurprisingly in the foreign aid department, whose arbitrary 0.7 per cent target should be scrapped as soon as possible.’

But Bernard Jenkin, chairman of the Commons public administration committee, said: ‘The cost of the civil service is a small part of overall government spending.

‘At the moment I am more concerned about the limited ability of Whitehall to contain the tasks it needs to do, such as Brexit.’ The four departments with more staff than in 2010 are DfID, which is 38.7 per cent larger, the Cabinet Office (30.8 per cent), the Department for Transport (9.6 per cent) and the Department for education (7.9 per cent).

The biggest reduction since 2010 is at the Department of health where numbers have halved since 2010. The Department for Communities and Local Government is 43 per cent smaller. Across Whitehall, there are now 391,640 fulltime equivalent civil servants, up from 384,260 a year earlier.

There have been short-term small increases in the number of officials over the past few years, but the latest figures reveal for the first time that the numbers have gone up four quarters in a row. IfG analyst Aron Cheung said: ‘While numbers are still far below their 2010 levels, the era of deep cuts to civil service staff numbers is over.’

Staff numbers at the Department for exiting the eU grew by 20.5 per cent in the three months after Article 50 was triggered at the end of March. But at the Department of health they fell by 2.3 per cent, with numbers also falling at the Department for Communities and Local Government and the Ministry of Defence. Mr Cheung said: ‘The civil service is still 20 per cent smaller than it was in 2010.’