Nobody owns the state's long-tail liabilities, and balance-sheet data arrives late and qualified

The Whole of Government Accounts is the only consolidated view of ~£1.4tn unfunded pension liabilities, £107bn nuclear decommissioning provisions (UKGI projects £115bn crystallising), clinical negligence and the contested £295bn student loan asset. It is published roughly 15 months after year-end and qualified, partly because disclaimed council audits corrupt the consolidation. UKGI's Contingent Liability Central Capability advises on new guarantees but does not manage legacy provisions; the OBR analyses sustainability but manages nothing; DfE's student-loan valuation model (the RAB charge) is not open to independent replication; the Treasury Committee's 2026 report 'Student loans: Broken and unfair?' criticised the system's opacity. No single institution is accountable for the liability side of the state's balance sheet.

Decisions with hundred-billion-pound balance-sheet consequences (pension uprating, tuition terms, decommissioning pace) are made without a timely consolidated picture or contestable models. Parliament scrutinises an accounting artefact published two budget cycles late.

A Treasury balance-sheet management mandate (extending UKGI's CLCC to legacy provisions), a statutory 9-month WGA publication deadline, and open-sourced valuation models for the major liabilities, starting with the student loan book, replicable by IFS and others.

// State-led: Instrument: Treasury balance-sheet mandate extending UKGI CLCC plus statutory nine-month WGA deadline.

Hundred-billion-pound decisions on pensions, decommissioning and student loans rest on accounts published fifteen months late and qualified, with no institution owning the liability side.