More or Less - Fact-check: Will Scottish pensioners really be funding English social care?
Download Fact-check: Will Scottish pensioners really be funding English social care?
Tim Harford investigates some of the numbers in the news. This week:
(00:40) First Minister John Swinney has claimed that Scottish pensioners are set to lose £2000, with the money going to fund English social care. We gently suggest he might like to consider the existence of the Barnett formula, and explain that, when you do, the picture looks very different.
(06:08 ) The Liberal Democrats have dug out data on maternity injuries that they claim is ‘a shocking indictment of our NHS maternity services’. We explore flaws in their analysis and ask an expert what a better source of data tells us about maternal healthcare.
(13:20) Professor Terence Tao is good at maths. Extremely good at maths. We ask him how he feels about AI being better at maths than him.
(15:49) Great news! The UK is reducing its deficit at the fastest rate of any G7 nation. Except we’re not. Ah, shame. But we are planning to! Fantastic! But we’ve got reason to be sceptical of these plans. That’s a pity. Join the FT’s Chris Giles on the economic and emotional rollercoaster that is the UK’s fiscal trajectory.
(21:14) The series reaches its intellectual zenith as we ask what would happen if you ‘put the whole of the country into baked beans’. Expect back of the tin workings, cutting edge agri-science research and true public service journalism. Just don’t ask what the nadir was.
Guests:
Dr Spencer Thompson - Senior Knowledge Exchange Fellow at the Fraser of Allander Institute
Professor Marian Knight - Director of the National Perinatal Epidemiology Unit at the University of Oxford
Chris Giles - Economics Commentator at the Financial Times
Professor Terence Tao - Professor of Mathematics at UCLA
Presenter: Tim Harford
Series Producer: Tom Colls
Reporters: Nathan Gower and Lizzy McNeill
Editor: Richard Vadon
Programme Coordinator: Maria Ogundele
Sound Engineer: James Beard
Published on Wednesday, 14th October 2026.
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