Britain's national debt passed £2,989.9bn in June 2026, but the balance sheets in trouble are not the ones 2008 taught everyone to watch. Banks passed a severe stress test and had their capital requirement cut; company pension schemes hold a £264.0bn surplus. The distress has moved to councils, water, universities and the NHS. Every future briefing measures against this baseline ledger.
The ledgers backed by a statutory resolution regime are healthy; the ones without one are deteriorating.
The Office for National Statistics put public sector net debt at £2,989.9bn at the end of June 2026, and then revised the previous month down by £8.3bn.
ONS reported public sector net debt of £2,989.9bn (94.9% of GDP) at end-June 2026, with June debt interest of £11.8bn and £33.3bn financial-year-to-date.
This is the headline number every outlet runs, and on its own it says almost nothing about which British balance sheet is actually in trouble.
MHCLG agreed emergency financial support in principle for 36 English councils for 2026-27, worth roughly £1.74bn. Two years earlier the figure was 18 councils.
MHCLG agreed Exceptional Financial Support in principle for 36 English councils for 2026-27, worth roughly £1.74bn, up from 18 councils two years earlier; six of the 36 are already under statutory intervention.
A backstop designed for a handful of outlier councils now covers three dozen authorities in a single year, and nothing about that crosses a legal threshold.
London & Valley Water, backed by Elliott Management and Apollo Global Management, offered £3.35bn of new equity and £3.25bn of fresh debt for Thames Water on 21 July 2026.
United KingdomLondon & Valley Water, backed by Elliott Management and Apollo Global Management, put forward a revised rescue proposal for Thames Water of £3.35bn new equity and £3.25bn fresh debt, requiring Ofwat approval, a public consultation and High Court sign-off.
Investors putting £6.6bn of their own money behind a company carrying £20bn of debt are arguing, with capital at risk, against the pure-distress reading of this ledger.
The Pension Protection Fund's July 2026 index showed 4,838 company pension schemes holding £1,112.6bn of assets against £848.6bn of promises, a funding ratio of 131.1%.
The Pension Protection Fund's PPF 7800 index showed defined-benefit schemes 131.1% funded with a £264.0bn aggregate surplus across 4,838 schemes in July 2026.
The balance sheet that frightened everyone in previous downturns now holds £1.31 for every £1 it has promised to pay out.
NHS England reported a £563m net system deficit for 2025/26 on 4 June 2026. Fifteen systems finished in the red, and five of them accounted for 88% of the total.
NHS England reported a full-year 2025/26 system deficit of £813m including deficit support funding, £563m net once withheld support and specialised commissioning were counted, with 15 systems in deficit and five accounting for 88% of the total.
A national deficit that shrank is sitting on top of a handful of places where the position is getting harder, and patients experience the local number, not the national one.
The Office for Students put 45% of English higher education providers in deficit for 2025-26, and forecasts that share falling to 41% next year once tuition fees track inflation.
The Office for Students put 45% of English higher education providers in deficit for 2025-26, forecasting improvement to 41% in 2026-27 as inflation-linked tuition fee rises feed through.
A university in deficit does not close; it quietly stops doing things, and students and local economies notice a year or two after the accounts do.
The company insolvency rate fell to 50.5 per 10,000 companies in the year to June 2026, down from 52.4, against a 2008-09 recession peak of 113.1.
The Insolvency Service recorded a company insolvency rate of 50.5 per 10,000 companies over the twelve months to 30 June 2026, down from 52.4, against a 2008-09 recession peak of 113.1.
The corporate ledger reads healthy on the same day the household one reads strained, which is why any answer to the masthead question has to name a balance sheet.
The Insolvency Service recorded an individual insolvency rate of 27.1 per 10,000 adults over the twelve months to 30 June 2026, up from 24.2 the year before.
The Insolvency Service recorded an individual insolvency rate of 27.1 per 10,000 adults over the twelve months to 30 June 2026, up from 24.2 a year earlier.
This is the clearest single sign of strain on the household ledger, and it is moving in the opposite direction to the company one.
Nottingham City Council issued a section 114 notice in March 2026, its third. The most-cited public tracker of such notices has not been updated since August 2024.
Nottingham City Council issued its third section 114 notice in March 2026, formally declaring it could not balance its budget.
Counting section 114 notices is the standard way to measure council failure, and the count in public circulation is nearly two years out of date.
The Bank of England modelled a severe recession through the banks' books, judged the system resilient, and then lowered the capital it requires them to hold by 100 basis points to 13%.
The Bank of England judged the banking system resilient to a severe hypothetical shock in its 2025 stress test and cut the assessed capital requirement by 100 basis points to 13%, implying an 11% CET1 ratio.
The institutions at the centre of 2008 are the one part of this register where a regulator has actively reduced its demands.
The Regulator of Social Housing published no sector-wide viability distribution for housing associations, saying its first year of programmed inspections is too early to draw trends from.
The Regulator of Social Housing published no sector-wide V1-V4 viability distribution, saying its first year of programmed inspections is too early to draw trends from; Sanctuary Housing Association and Railway Housing Association and Benefit Fund were upgraded to consumer grade C1 on 27 May 2026 while London Borough of Islington was graded C3.
One of the nine ledgers cannot be measured at all, and the honest thing to do is carry the gap rather than fill it with an estimate.
The OBR costs Britain's path from 2.6% of GDP on defence to the NATO target of 3.5% by 2035 at roughly £40bn a year. The IFS says about £25bn a year of it has no funding attached.
The OBR costs the path from 2.6% of GDP in 2026 to 3.5% by 2035 under the NATO target at roughly £40bn a year in 2025/26 prices, and the IFS puts about £25bn a year of it still unfunded against plans announced so far.
The nine ledgers measure distress that already exists; this measures a claim arriving faster than the money to meet it.
HM Treasury and the Ministry of Defence published the £10.3bn Defence Investment Plan breakdown on 30 June 2026. £3.5bn of it comes from asset sales and Treasury support, neither of which can happen twice.
HM Treasury and the Ministry of Defence published a £10.3bn Defence Investment Plan funding breakdown on 30 June 2026: £4.0bn from a 1p capital budget cut, £1.1bn asset sales, £2.4bn Treasury support, £0.8bn from the Department for Transport and £2.0bn from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, with £4.7bn deferred to Budget 2026.
Published as one number it looks like funding; published as its parts it shows a permanent bill part-paid with money that arrives once.
The OBR now costs the state pension triple lock at £15.5bn a year by 2029-30, against the £5.2bn originally projected. The figure reaches us through IFS commentary rather than an OBR release.
The OBR now costs the state pension triple lock at £15.5bn a year by 2029-30, against an original £5.2bn projection, roughly triple, relayed through IFS commentary.
A claim that grows with demography is outrunning its own forecast by a factor of three, and the tax base underneath it is growing at 1.1%.
The government extended the Dedicated Schools Grant statutory override by two years to 2027-28, announced on 23 June 2025, and is now funding up to 90% of eligible high-needs deficits.
The government extended the Dedicated Schools Grant statutory override by two years to the end of 2027-28, announced 23 June 2025, and is now funding up to 90% of eligible high-needs deficits through a High Needs Stability Grant.
A widely reported route to mass council failure was closed over a year ago, and models built on the old projection are carrying a risk that was withdrawn.
The IMF's tables, statistical appendix and DataMapper interface returned access errors across five URLs on two attempts, so this briefing publishes a G7 debt comparison with no British figure in it.
The IMF's tables, statistical appendix and DataMapper interface returned access errors across five URLs on two attempts, leaving the UK row empty in the April 2026 World Economic Outlook debt comparison against Japan, Italy, the United States, France, Canada and Germany.
The obvious fix would be to drop Britain's 94.9% into the gap, and it would be a category error dressed up as completeness.
Sideways in aggregate, moving in opposite directions by ledger. The individual insolvency rate rose from 24.2 to 27.1 per 10,000 adults and the Exceptional Financial Support authority count doubled in two years, both without a single declared trigger firing yet; over the same period the company insolvency rate fell and the Bank of England cut bank capital requirements by 100 basis points in December 2025. The one ledger closest to a discrete, dateable event is water: Ofwat's decision on the £6.6bn London & Valley Water proposal, due once its public consultation and High Court process conclude, is the specific mechanism that would tip Thames Water into the Special Administration Regime rather than a negotiated private rescue.
