Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what the cost to the public purse was for (a) the civil service and (b) public administration in the financial years (i) 2019-20, (ii) 2022-23 and (iii) 2023-24 as of 20 November 2023.

To answer part (a) of the question: The total salary bill for the civil service can be approximately calculated using data from Cabinet Office owned national statistics, Civil Service Statistics. A link to the latest Civil Service Statistics is available here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/civil-service-statistics-2023/statistical-bulletin-civil-service-statistics-2023

Part (b) asks about public administration from budgetary tables published in HM Treasury’s Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses (PESA) it is possible to obtain administrative spending by government departmental group. Please refer to Table 1.7 within the link to PESA 2023 below:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/public-expenditure-statistical-analyses-2023

In-year expenditure data for 2023-24, from which it is possible to obtain administration budgets, are available from HM Treasury’s OSCAR Transparency release. A link is provided below:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/oscar-ii-publishing-data-from-the-database-september-2023