Ben Farrugia: Britain's unseen £64 billion state

Ben Farrugia is a Policy Analyst at the TaxPayers’ Alliance.  In this Platform piece he examines the dizzying scale and £64bn cost of Britain's 1,162 quangoes.

Five years ago, the Public Administration Select Committee strongly recommended that the Government compile and publish a list of all the quangos, agencies and other unelected bodies that exist in the UK. Given that the Government has chosen to ignore that recommendation, we at the TaxPayers’ Alliance have produced that list (PDF) for them, to allow the public to truly appreciate the sheer size and scope of Government in Britain.

People have of course been aware for some years that quangos have been on the rise, with ever larger portions of taxpayers’ money and public policy being passed out of democratic control and into the hands of a myriad of bodies. But most will still be shocked by the true extent of Britain’s unseen government. Like an iceberg, whose vast mass lies hidden beneath the water line, the familiar quangos represent only a small part a whole unknown layer of government.

The full picture is staggering. Alongside the departments directly controlled by Westminster and the devolved assemblies, and those duties overseen by local government, there exists a convoluted hierarchy of agencies and quangos, hundreds of bodies existing to implement specific aspects of government policy. The TPA’s research has uncovered no fewer than 1,162 of these bodies, in receipt of over £64 billion of taxpayers’ money and employing almost 700,000 people. This is the most comprehensive survey of the quango industry ever compiled, but there are no doubt other bodies yet to be identified.