Michael Simmons
There’s good and bad news in the public finance figures, released by the Office for National Statistics this morning.
July saw something of a borrowing splurge, with £1.8 billion needed from the markets to keep Britain afloat. That was up two-thirds on July last year and £2.3 billion above forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility, which had expected a surplus.
But on a year-to-date basis, the borrowing figures were actually not that bad. Indeed, on the face of it, they make for fairly good news. In the financial year to July, overall borrowing has come in £6 billion lower than in the same period in 2025 – and only slightly above the OBR’s forecast. The net result is that national debt remains below £3 trillion (for now), despite some over-excited calculations from thinktanks in the last couple of weeks.
There are even better numbers for the government, which come in the current budget deficit: borrowing to fund day-to-day spending. In July, a £3.1 billion surplus was chalked up, and the total for this financial year is bang on the OBR’s forecast, nearly £7 billion lower than last year.
