The Conservatives have released a new video in which they attack the Labour Government’s record.

Entitled ‘What Happens In One Minute of Labour’, it makes a series of claims about crime, the economy, schools, debt and taxes that the Tories claim occur during each minute of the current Government.

Full Fact couldn’t resist the temptation to investigate, so we called CCHQ to find out how they made their calculations. Here's our analysis:

School suspensions - “Four children are suspended from school every minute”

Annually, the Tory video suggests over 2.1 million kids are suspended from school each year.

However, figures from the four home nations show a total of 460,000 exclusions in 2007-08. This includes permanent exclusions as well as suspensions, which are officially termed fixed-term exclusions. Details are in the table below.

The Conservative party have calculated the figures differently – this is what they sent us.

“The DCSF figures show that in 2007/8, there were 383,830 fixed period exclusions from schools in England. The DCSF says there are 190 days in a school year.

“Based on an 8 hour school day, this means there were 4.209 suspensions per minute of the school year. As school days are often shorter than 8 hours, this is likely to be an under-estimate.”

The Conservative party method does arrive at a figure of 4 suspensions a minute when only counting the approximate number of minutes in the school year rather than the whole year.

Quangos - “Every minute the Government takes £964,612 from us in tax while unelected quangos cost the taxpayer £170,765”

All political parties have taken turns to attack the size, cost and accountability of ‘quangos’ (officially known as non-departmental public bodies or NDPBs).

According to the Tories these public bodies take a large proportion of tax revenue and cost the taxpayer £89.9 billion a year. However, the latest Cabinet Office report on NDPBs shows that in 2008-09 the actual figure was £38.4 billion.

The Conservatives figure is based on a TaxPayers’ Alliance report from 2007-08 which calculated total Government funding of all quangos at £91 billion. This does work out at approximately £170,000 a minute.

Why the difference between the Taxpayers’ Alliance and the official Cabinet Office figures? The simple answer is that the Taxpayers’ Alliance has a broader definition of what represents a ‘quango’ than official Government figures, which only count NDPBs.

The Taxpayers’ Alliance include public corporations such as the BBC and Government owned not-for-profit companies such as the Carbon Trust. With a broader approach the Taxpayers’ Alliance count over 1000 quangos in the UK, whereas the Cabinet Office count 766 NDPBs sponsored by the UK Government.

Drawing firm conclusions on the Tory claim is difficult as there is no agreed definition of what a ‘quango’ is. The Conservatives / Taxpayers’ Alliance figure is at the higher end of estimates of the total cost of quangos; the Government figures are at the lower end.

Jobs - “Every minute two people lose their jobs”

The Labour Force Survey figures support this claim based on 2009. Last year there were a total of 939,000 redundancies which is the equivalent to 1.8 jobs lost every minute.

At the same time, the claim does not consider overall employment levels. Taking into account new jobs created shows there have been a total of 406,000 job losses in the last year. Using the Conservatives' by the minute analysis, this represents the lower figure of 0.8 jobs lost per minute.

Violent crimes - “Each minute two violent crimes are committed”

Despite recent difficulties on crime statistics, on this occasion the Tories are accurate. They suggest there are 1.05 million violent crimes committed in the UK each year. According to the British Crime Survey in 2009 there were a total of just over a million violent crimes.

CO2 Emissions - “915 tones of carbon dioxide are release into our atmosphere”

This claim checks out based on the provisional annual carbon emission figures for the UK produced by the Department of Energy and Climate Change. The record shows that 480.9 million tonnes of carbon were emitted in 2009.

If this is divided by the 526,000 or so minutes in a year, it comes in at a little over 915 tonnes each minute. 

Business bureaucracy:  “Red tape costs businesses £13,691”

The British Chambers of Commerce’s Burdens Barometer 2009 says that the total cost of new regulation introduced between November 1998 and 1 July 2009 is £76.81bn.

From 1 November 1998 to 1 July 2009, inclusive, taking into account leap years, there were 3,896 days. On this basis new regulation cost £13,691.04 per minute.

It is worth noting that the Institute of Directors regulation reckoner actually gives a higher figure. Their report published earlier this month put the annual cost of regulation to directors at £80 billion (£152,207 per minute).

Anti-social behaviour - “There are seven incidents of anti-social behaviour”

This claim checks out. It is based on a recent parliamentary answer which revealed that police forces in England and Wales recorded 3,661,498 incidents of anti-social behaviour in 2008-09. This works out as 6.9 incidents per minute.

Police on the beat - “More police officers fill in forms than walk the beat”

The Conservatives cite a parliamentary answer which suggests police spend more time on paperwork then they do on patrol. According to the answer, in 2007-08 police officers spent 13.8 per cent of their time on patrol, compared to 21.7 per cent on paperwork.

At the same time, it is interesting to note that the Conservative attack on excessive form filling among the police is based on data collected through… yes, police form filling!

The information was collected through an annual police activity analysis form which required police officers to account for their activity in 15 minute time slots. As part of an effort to reduce bureaucracy the Government has since abolished this requirement.

The NHS – “Every minute £8,562 is spent on NHS bureaucracy but only £5,900 on maternity care”

The claim on maternity care is supported by Department of Health figures showing that in 2008-09 in England £3.1 billion was spent on maternity and reproductive health. This equates to £5,900 a minute.

In terms of the burecracy costs, this is based on a calculation that the total administration costs of the Department of Health, Primary Care Trusts, Strategic Health Authorities and NHS quangos is £4.5 billion a year (or £8,562 per minute). While the figure has been previously cited by Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley, we are yet to confirm all the calculations behind it.

 
By Tim Swain and Patrick Casey