The people applying for this job are probably not the people you want to hire...

You'll always get applicants, no matter how low you are compared to the market rate but the quality of the applications will suffer.

I'm sure at least 30 out of the 31 are woefully under-qualified.

Even for a government role I would expect 2.5-3x the salary.

Yeah as someone who’s had job ads out recently if they have 1 qualified out of 31 they’re doing well!

Or they're not even in the UK nor have any sort of work permit / visa.

Who's qualified will be decided by some bureaucrat who couldn't tell ICMP from NSFW. Master of Science from Doddaballapura Imperial College? Say no more. Ransomwaring the UK Treasury would be awesome.