Five areas where the UK government's economic data is shaky
Experts say the figures the UK government uses on immigration, unemployment, inflation, free school meals and homelessness are patchy. That casts doubt on the numbers behind this week's budget.
The British government runs on numbers, but many of them turn out to be unreliable. That is the conclusion of POLITICO's Westminster Insider podcast, whose latest episode, published on 30 October 2026, examined data quality. The trigger was this week's budget from Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey, which was full of grim figures on economic growth and household incomes. Its forecasts will almost certainly be revised before the next fiscal event.
Immigration
Until 2025, migration was measured by the International Passenger Survey, in which people at airports, stations and ports were asked about their plans to stay. Between 2012 and 2020, arrivals of EU nationals were misjudged by 76%, or 93,000 people a year. The replacement method combines Home Office, Department for Work and Pensions and tax data, but it also erred: net migration for the year to June 2023 was first put at 672,000, then corrected a year later to 906,000. Laura Gilbert, who ran data science at No. 10 Downing Street until last year, says politicians often rely on the first figure, which is the worst one.
Unemployment
The Labour Force Survey missed 1 million workers between 2019 and 2024, according to the Resolution Foundation think tank. The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), the fiscal watchdog, admitted this week that the survey is too unreliable for measuring productivity. Gilbert considers Healey's claim of 1 million young people out of work unlikely to be accurate.
Inflation and GDP
The OBR says there is a one-in-five chance that inflation in 2027 will exceed 4.5%, and the same chance that it will fall below 2.5%. Gilbert explains that errors in migration and workforce data feed into GDP and inflation projections.
Free school meals and homelessness
Just over 2.2 million pupils in England receive free school meals, more than a quarter of children, but Gilbert believes the figure is overstated because schools "game the system" during census counts. Rough-sleeper counts also vary by council, with some using estimates and others street counts. Brighton and Hove estimated 176 in 2017, then counted 68 on a snowy night the next year. Prime Minister Andy Burnham's government allocated £432 million in the budget to ending homelessness.
