Labour is determined to wreck the public sector by entrenching low productivity while increasing costs.
The civil service is bloated - there are nearly 100,000 more of them than in 2015.
Our productivity is low. Amazingly, since 1997, public sector productivity has fallen by an average of 0.1 per cent per year, an unprecedented problem in a technological age.
Meanwhile, the private sector's productivity has been growing, albeit too slowly. This ends up costing you money.
Jacob Rees-Mogg issues a stark warning on Labour's economics
GB News
As the former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak pointed out on the campaign trail, public sector productivity is about 5 per cent lower than it was before the pandemic.
If we were simply able to bring that productivity back to where it was, then that would be worth £20billion and it would improve services.
This sort of saving is equivalent to abolishing inheritance tax three times over, or nearly getting rid of all fuel duties.
In other words, one of the main ambitions of any government ought to be driving public sector productivity to ensure you get value for your money. Alas, that is the opposite of what is happening.
Not only has the Labour Government engaged in a cynical quid pro quo with its union chums, taking nearly half a million in campaign donations before offering the unions massive pay rises - Not only are they inflating idlers rights such as the right to switch off, but now the Prime Minister is backing the right to work from home, with number ten warning that a culture of presentism is bad for productivity.
But we've seen since people started working from home, productivity has fallen. So this is nonsense. Working from home has been tried and is failing.
How many of my viewers have tried calling HMRC and actually both got through and received a sensible answer? If it really did lead to an increase in productivity, we certainly haven't seen it since its popularity increased during the pandemic.
It was one of my main ambitions as Minister for Government Efficiency to get civil servants back to the office. And so you may see some irony that I this week am working from home, but I would otherwise be on holiday. But I didn't want to miss you. So here I am at home in the summer.
Interestingly, Stanford University has done a study on the efficacy of working from home, and last year it showed that it was between 10 and 20 per cent less productive. You see, we are led by people, as Ross Clarke said in The Spectator today, who really don't understand what makes societies prosper.
It doesn't lie with inflating worker's rights to switch off. It doesn't lie with the public sector and certainly doesn't lie with working from home.
The answer lies with unleashing the animal spirits of the private sector, cutting back the size of the mighty state and rolling back its overreach, deregulation, low energy costs and cutting taxes.
Until the Labour Party realises this, we will be doomed to a future of high taxes, low productivity and low growth, making everybody poorer and idler. Being idle won't make you rich.
