Rishi Sunak slapped down by statistics watchdog for wrongly claiming debt is falling
Rishi Sunak has been chastised by the UK’s statistics watchdog for claiming to have reduced public debt – despite not having done so.
Sir Robert Chote, the chair of the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA), said the prime minister’s assertion that “debt is falling” may have caused “confusion” and “undermined trust in the government’s use of statistics”.
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Reducing debt is one of the five pledges Mr Sunak made to the public at the start of the year, alongside cutting NHS waiting lists and “stopping the boats”.
He claimed “debt is falling” in a video posted on social media after the King’s Speech on 7 November and that “we have indeed reduced debt” at Prime Minister’s Questions on 22 November, the day of the Autumn Statement.
However, Liberal Democrat MP Sarah Olney questioned the veracity of the claim – pointing to a projection from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) that month which showed public sector net debt has risen on every measure.
Number 10 had argued Mr Sunak was referring to a projection that debt would be falling as a proportion of GDP by 2028.
But responding to Ms Olney’s concerns, Sir Robert said “the average person in the street” would have interpreted the comment to mean “debt was already falling or that the government’s policy decisions had lowered it at fiscal events – neither of which is the case”.
He added: “This has clearly been a source of confusion and may have undermined trust in the government’s use of statistics and quantitative analysis in this area.
“Members of the public cannot be expected to understand the minutiae of public finance statistics and the precise combination of definitional choices that might need to be made for a particular claim to be true.”
Ms Olney accused the prime minister of “reaching for the Boris Johnson playbook” and undermining trust.
She said: “Rishi Sunak knows he has no good story to tell on the UK economy so he has resorted to making one up. The least this no-growth prime minister could do is be honest about it with the British public.
“Instead, he has reached for the Boris Johnson playbook and undermined trust in politics. This is desperate stuff from a desperate prime minister and it is right that he has been called out on it.”
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Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has announced five goals which he says the government will accomplish this year.
It comes after Mr Sunak briefed his cabinet this morning on the progress of his five pledges which he made in January.
They are: Halving inflation, growing the economy, reducing national debt, cutting NHS waiting lists and stopping boats from crossing the Channel.
Mr Sunak said successes included halving inflation and reducing small boat crossings by a third, “but that there is still much work to do that will require continued dedication”.
While inflation has halved, critics said that was more to do with Bank of England policy – and the cost of living crisis remains, with the economy flatlining this year.
Read More:
UK economy flatlines but avoids recession this year
Meanwhile, thousands of people have come to the UK in small boats amid chaos over the Rwanda deportation policy.
And while NHS waiting lists fell slightly for the first time this year in October, the appointments backlog is still 7.71 million (down from a record 7.7m the month before), with the NHS bracing for a difficult winter.
Anti-corruption authorities in Bangladesh have issued a warrant for the arrest of British Labour MP Tulip Siddiq.
Bangladesh’s Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) sought the warrant over allegations Ms Siddiq received a 7,200sq ft plot of land in the country’s capital, Dhaka.
Ms Siddiq’s lawyers have told Sky News the allegations are “completely false”, adding there was “no basis at all for any charges to be made against her”.
They said there was “absolutely no truth” behind the allegations regarding the plot of land.
The MP resigned as a Treasury minister earlier this year following an investigation by the prime minister’s ethics adviser into her links to her aunt Sheikh Hasina’s regime, which was overthrown in Bangladesh last year.
Earlier this month, Ms Siddiq told Sky News her lawyers were “ready” to handle any formal questions about allegations of corruption in Bangladesh.
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Tulip Siddiq’s lawyers ‘are ready’
In her first public comments since leaving government, Ms Siddiq said “there’s been allegations for months on end and no one has contacted me”.
Last month, the interim leader of Bangladesh told Sky News the MP had “wealth left behind” in the country “and should be made responsible”.
Lawyers acting for Ms Siddiq wrote to the Bangladeshi Anti Corruption Commission (ACC) several weeks ago saying the allegations were “false and vexatious”.
The allegations surrounding Ms Siddiq are focused on links to her aunt Ms Hasina – who served as the prime minister of Bangladesh for 20 years.
Ms Hasina was forced to flee the country in August following weeks of deadly protests.
She is accused of becoming an autocrat, with politically-motivated arrests and other abuses allegedly happening on her watch. Ms Hasina claims it is all a political witch hunt.
Tulip Siddiq with Sheikh Hasina in 2009. Pic: Reuters
Ms Siddiq’s lawyer said in a statement that she “has not been contacted by the ACC or any authorities in Bangladesh”.
“The ACC has made various allegations against Ms Siddiq through the media in the last few months,” they said.
“The allegations are completely false and have been dealt with in writing by Ms Siddiq’s lawyers. The ACC has not responded to Ms Siddiq or put any allegations to her directly or through her lawyers.
“Ms Siddiq knows nothing about a hearing in Dhaka relating to her and she has no knowledge of any arrest warrant that is said to have been issued.
“To be clear, there is no basis at all for any charges to be made against her, and there is absolutely no truth in any allegation that she received a plot of land in Dhaka through illegal means.
“She has never had a plot of land in Bangladesh, and she has never influenced any allocation of plots of land to her family members or anyone else.
“No evidence has been provided by the ACC to support this or any other allegation made against Ms Siddiq, and it is clear to us that the charges are politically motivated.”
Senator Tim Scott, the chairman of the US Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, recently said that he expects a crypto market bill to be passed into law by August 2025.
The chairman also noted the Senate Banking Committee’s advancement of the GENIUS Act, a comprehensive stablecoin regulatory bill, in March 2025, as evidence that the committee prioritizes crypto policy. In a statement to Fox News, Scott said:
“We must innovate before we regulate — allowing innovation in the digital asset space to happen here at home is critical to American economic dominance across the globe.”
Scott’s timeline for a crypto market structure bill lines up with expectations from Kristin Smith, CEO of the crypto industry advocacy group Blockchain Association, of market structure and stablecoin legislation being passed into law by August.
The Trump administration has emphasized that comprehensive crypto regulations are central to its plans for protecting the value of the US dollar and establishing the country as a global leader in digital assets by attracting investment into US-based crypto firms.
Senator Tim Scott highlights the Senate Banking Committee’s goals and accomplishments in 2025. Source: Fox News
Related: Atkins becomes next SEC chair: What’s next for the crypto industry
Support for comprehensive crypto regulations is bipartisan
US lawmakers and officials expect clear crypto policies to be established and signed into law sometime in 2025 with bipartisan support from Congress.
Speaking at the Digital Assets Summit in New York City, on March 18, Democrat Representative Ro Khanna said he expects both the market structure and stablecoin bills to pass this year.
The Democrat lawmaker added that there are about 70-80 other representatives in the party who understand the importance of passing clear digital asset regulations in the United States.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, pictured left, President Donald Trump in the center, and crypto czar David Sacks, pictured right, at the White House Crypto Summit. Source: The White House
Khanna emphasized that fellow Democrats support dollar-pegged stablecoins due to the role of dollar tokens in expanding demand for the US dollar worldwide through the internet.
Bo Hines, the executive director of the President’s Council of Advisers on Digital Assets, also spoke at the conference and predicted that stablecoin legislation would be passed into law within 60 days.
Hines highlighted that establishing US dominance in the digital asset space is a goal with widespread bipartisan support in Washington DC.
Magazine: How crypto laws are changing across the world in 2025
The US Social Security Administration (SSA) will move all public communications to the X social media platform amid sweeping workforce cuts recommended by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by X owner Elon Musk.
According to anonymous sources who spoke with WIRED, the government agency will no longer issue its customary letters and press releases to communicate changes to the public, instead relying on X as its primary form of public-facing communication.
The shift comes as the SSA downsizes its workforce from 57,000 employees to roughly 50,000 to reduce costs and improve operational efficiency. The agency issued this statement in February 2025:
“SSA has operated with a regional structure consisting of 10 offices, which is no longer sustainable. The agency will reduce the regional structure in all agency components down to four regions. The organizational structure at Headquarters also is outdated and inefficient.”
Elon Musk, the head of DOGE, has accused the Social Security system of distributing billions of dollars in wrongful payments, a claim echoed by the White House. Musk’s comments sparked intense debate about the future of the retirement program and sustainable government spending.
Source: Elon Musk
Related: Musk says he found ‘magic money computers’ printing money ‘out of thin air’
DOGE targets US government agencies in efficiency push
The Department of Government Efficiency is an unofficial government agency tasked with identifying and curbing allegedly wasteful public spending through budget and personnel cuts.
In March, DOGE began probing the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and gained access to its internal systems, including data repositories.
SEC officials signaled their cooperation with DOGE and said the regulatory agency would work closely with it to provide any relevant information requested.
Musk and Trump discuss curbing public spending and eliminating government waste. Source: The White house
DOGE also proposed slashing the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) workforce by 20%. The workforce reduction could impact up to 6,800 IRS employees and be implemented by May 15 — exactly one month after 2024 federal taxes are due.
Musk’s and the DOGE’s proposals for sweeping spending cuts are not limited to slashing budgets and reducing the size of the federal workforce.
DOGE is reportedly exploring blockchain to curb public spending by placing the entire government budget onchain to promote accountability and transparency.
Magazine: Elon Musk’s plan to run government on blockchain faces uphill battle
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