Focus on pay restraint distorts Rishi Sunak's spending review

The chancellor is targeting savings from departments that will need more funding not less

The government has embarked on a spending review across Whitehall that the chancellor says must include pay restraint.

Rishi Sunak, in a letter to his cabinet colleagues, spells out his priorities for Whitehall departments and in among the calls for Britain to become a scientific superpower", improve public services and tackle crime, is the demand for a clampdown on pay.

Related: Coronavirus: almost 900,000 public sector workers to get pay rise, says Sunak