The man responsible for negotiating spending totals for all departments was the Chief Secretary to the Treasury Darren Jones.
Reportedly not all the negotiations were entirely amicable, with one source telling a Sunday newspaper: “If you want a glimpse into the dystopian AI future, where the world is run by autocratic robots devoid of any emotion or humanity, then you need to spend five minutes in a meeting with Darren Jones.”
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: So, let’s spend five minutes with Darren Jones. Now, we talked about the winners with the boss. So we have to talk about the people who are unhappy and the police are the… You know, one of the big headlines, they are saying this will basically just cover pay rises. There may well be a shortfall, and they will not be able to deliver your targets and 13,000 extra police officers.
Darren Jones: Well, nice to be with you. I’ll be as emotion-filled and creative as possible to distinguish myself from an AI system. Look, the police are getting over 2% increase year-on-year in their budgets. In the context of the economy overall, that is a good deal. I’m not saying it’s an easy thing for the police. I know there are many challenges that we want to work with them on. But we’ve been really clear that we want to help them make sure they’re getting special constables, community support officers and police officers back into the neighbourhood.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But they’re saying they can’t. The Police Federation, the chief constables, they’re all saying this isn’t enough to deliver what you promised.
Darren Jones: So the police delivered nearly 20,000 additional police officers in the last few years for less money. We’re asking for 13,000 more additional officers with more money. So I’m sure there is a way of doing it. Look, they’re perfectly entitled to make the case. They do an important job for us, and we’re very grateful to them. All I would say is that 2% growth guaranteed for each and every year of this parliament, in the circumstances we find ourselves in, is a pretty good deal, and we think we can deliver on our promises in that context.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But you have ended up doing precisely what we’ve asked you about for the last 18 months. And we went into conversations with you every time saying you’re going to put up the total spending, but individual departments will face cuts. In their terms, austerity.
Darren Jones: No.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Wouldn’t it have been more honest to go into the election and say yes, there will be tough decisions for some departments and that will mean job losses in some cases and cuts in services.
Darren Jones: Well, look, it’s not austerity, because when you look at total spending, money’s going up, not down. We’ve talked about that before. Look, there are some departments where day-to-day costs have a little negative number, but those are for good reasons. So in the Home Office, outside of policing, spending’s going down because we’re getting…
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: So these are good cuts?
Darren Jones: Yeah, because we’re getting out of asylum hotels, no-one wants to spend billions of pounds a year paying Premier Inn to house asylum seekers…
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: So where are you going to put asylum seekers?
Darren Jones: … waiting for a decision. We’re going to get through the process more efficiently. We’ve already returned over 20,000 people in the first hour of the month.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But where will they go? I mean, there will still be asylum seekers.
Darren Jones: Sure.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But if they’re not going to be in hotels, where are they going to live?
Darren Jones: They go home. If they’re not allowed to stay here, they go home.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Well, but in the process…
Darren Jones: So they don’t stay in our hotels.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: They’re not going to be instant decisions.
Darren Jones: No, but they’re going to be much…
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: So they’re going to need to be housed. Where are they going to be?
Darren Jones: So, it’s going to be much quicker than it has been under the last government, we’re already doing that. And where they do need to reside here whilst they’re waiting for a decision, we are putting money in today for government-owned accommodation instead of paying hotel chains to house asylum seekers waiting for a decision.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: So they’re not going to be going into private rented accommodation, you know, otherwise people will say, well, you’re spending 39 billion on social housing and it’s going to be housing asylum seekers.
Darren Jones: No, no, asylum seekers that are waiting for a decision stay in temporary accommodation. We’re building the temporary accommodation and reducing the total number of people waiting, as opposed to paying for hotels.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But that depends on the Home Office’s ability to deliver.
Darren Jones: For sure.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: And their budget’s being squeezed.
Darren Jones: No, but they’ve got a good budget to be able to do these types of things. Let me give you another example, transport, which was on Helia’s slide. The reason there’s a negative number on day-to-day spending for transport is because we’re not having to subsidise the railways as much because more people are using the train than they did in the outcome of Covid. So it’s good that we’re not having to pay for passengers that are not on the train.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But you can’t guarantee that that’s not going to lead to a rise in fares, can you?
Darren Jones: Well the fares are set at CPI plus 1%, I mean that’s normal. But we had to give extra money to the train companies to keep them afloat because fewer people use them coming out of the pandemic. That’s getting better and therefore we’re spending less and that’s a good thing.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: The other thing you definitely factored in is a rise in council tax. That’s where we’re going to be paying for this, at 5% increases.
Darren Jones: So councils decide themselves, not us, how much they want to increase their council tax. It can be anything from zero to 5%. And different councils do different things in different parts of the country.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Yeah but you’re relying on that for policing, for example.
Darren Jones: So we are making assumptions in the spending today that councils will behave in a similar way to the way they behave recently, which is money that goes direct to the police service.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But our taxes are going to go up. But it’s to pay for these services, aren’t they? That’s the point.
Darren Jones: Councils decide on their council tax. They’ve gone up in recent years. Are the councils likely to increase them? I suspect so, but it’s their decision. The spending review today is an assumption that they’ll continue to act in the way they’ve acted recently.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: The bigger problem, really, is that you promised change. And this isn’t going to feel like enough change.
Darren Jones: Oh, that’s nonsense. There is tonnes of change in the spending review, Krishnan.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Well, of course there is change, but you know, the NHS is not getting as much as it’s got historically. You’re not going to deliver transformational change in the NHS on that budget rise.
Darren Jones: I disagree.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: And the NHS Confederation, Matthew Taylor, has said that.
Darren Jones: I disagree, I disagree.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: What, the expert is just wrong?
Darren Jones: No, I just disagree with the question that you’ve put to me. We’re putting in huge amounts of funding money into the NHS. They are going to have the largest budget they’ve ever had.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Yes, but will people feel change?
Darren Jones: Yes, because we’re prioritising it.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: That’s the problem you’ve got.
Darren Jones: Yes, yes.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: We’re not in the same world as we were 15 years ago. People have very high expectations because you promised them.
Darren Jones: Yeah, yeah.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: And there’s a real question mark over whether we’re going to feel it. You accept that we don’t feel it now. How do you know we’re going to feel it in two years’ time or three years?
Darren Jones: You’re just being pessimistic.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: It’s Keir Starmer who admitted that people don’t feel it.
Darren Jones: No, no. And I agree that right now, do we think that our public services are working as well as they should be? No. But what we’ve agreed today is the spending plans and the reform plans to be able to modernise and improve those public services. There’s a whole tonne of stuff in the NHS, whether it’s about test results or appointments or the elective process or funding for better scanners so that you can get your scans more efficiently. Wes Streeting and their team…
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: So it’s all on Wes Streeting now? It’s down to them to deliver.
Darren Jones: The department have got to deliver the promises that we’ve set out. That’s what happens when you run a department. But there’s a whole tonne of other stuff, whether it’s about free school meals, getting those potholes filled, paying for more local transport, more council housing, affordable housing, a huge increase in council house funding across the country. There’s a tonne of stuff being announced today that people will feel, and they’ll see the difference that the Labour government is making.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: And I know on taxes you’ll say well I can’t write the budget now and I can’t promise anything, but the fact that there’s a big hole around defence, you’ve got to 2.6, you got to get to 3, that’s your aim. You’re going to have to pay for it somehow, are you just going to borrow or?
Darren Jones: So, the spending review today spends the budget that the chancellor gave us in the budget last year.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: No, I know, but I’m talking about what’s after that.
Darren Jones: And the commitment from this parliament on defence spending is that we’ll get to 2.7%, 2.6%, sorry, by 2027. That is fully funded in the spending today.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: And how do you get to 3?
Darren Jones: That’s a decision for the next spending review in SR27 because that comes in later years after the next election.
Krishnan Guru-Murthy: So we could be looking at tax rises.
Darren Jones: Well, look, we’re going to have to figure that out. Of course we are. But it depends on fiscal circumstances. We’re investing to try and get the economy growing. We’re trying to reduce the cost of delivering better public services for people. We’ve got a lot of stuff there. This is why we’re investing in the renewal of Britain, because we can’t just keep going round and round the broken system that we’ve had now for many, many years. I’m really confident in our plans today and our ability to change Britain. That’s what we promised. That’s why we are going to be getting on to deliver. People are going to be better off and Britain is going to be renewed as a consequence.
Watch more here:
Spending Review explained: what Labour’s economic plans mean for UK
Spending Review: voters react to Labour plans for the UK economy
Labour ‘will have to spend more on defence’ – Conservative MP
