The Cabinet Office estimates that government commits around £130 billion to grants each year – nearly 20% of all government spend. Grants are an important delivery mechanism for policy across government, not just centrally but also in agencies, local authorities and other bodies across the public sector.
The programme to upgrade to the Thameslink routes through London has a realistic prospect of delivering value for money but there remains risks which the Department for Transport and Network Rail need to manage carefully.
Annual spending on consultants and temporary staff has reduced by £1.5 billion since 2010 when strict spending controls were introduced. However, annual spend is now increasing once more and is between £400 million and £600 million higher than in 2011-12.
This document summarises the findings of our work and identifies sources of help that may be useful to local areas and government departments supporting local public service reform.
The affordability of the Ministry of Defence’s Equipment Plan.
This report examines the evidence base supporting the decision to proceed with the Thames Tideway Tunnel, a tunnel running 25 kilometres from Acton to Abbey Mills, as well as progress achieved to date.
Having shown that the concept of a national citizen service has something to offer young people, to demonstrate value for money the OCS and the Trust now need to show they can grow NCS as intended and run it at a more affordable cost to the taxpayer.
The Department of Energy and Climate Change’s Green Deal design not only failed to deliver any meaningful benefit, it increased suppliers’ costs – and therefore energy bills – in meeting their obligations through the ECO scheme.
Local authorities have kept up levels of capital spending but face pressure to meet debt costs and maintain investment in existing assets.
The financial performance of acute hospital trusts has deteriorated sharply and their financial performance looks set to worsen in 2015-16.
The Better Care Fund has not achieved the expected value for money, in terms of savings, outcomes for patients or hospital activity.
The BBC has improved the value for money of its activity, but there is scope to make improvements, particularly on licence fee evasion and the incomplete transition programme.
HM Revenue & Customs’ (HMRC’s) contract with Synnex-Concentrix UK Ltd was terminated in November 2016. The contract was designed to add capacity to HMRC’s programme of interventions to prevent or detect error and fraud in personal tax credits awards. HMRC estimated that the contract would save £1 billion over its three year life time and an estimated £193 million, excluding Concentrix’s costs, had been saved by the time of contract termination.
Staff numbers and costs have reduced significantly in the last five years. Not enough planning, however, has gone into making sure that the reductions are sustainable.
The case for a huge expansion of electronic monitoring using GPS was unproven, but the Ministry of Justice pursued an overly ambitious and high risk strategy anyway. Ultimately it has not delivered.
This overview of the NAO’s work on the government’s management of contracting examines subjects including the government’s commercial capability, accountability and transparency, and its management of contracted-out service delivery.
The Department has made good progress since we last reported on Carrier Strike, however it still has a lot to do to meet its targets at the end of 2020.
The NAO’s findings from its investigation into whether £1.3m of donations from a charity, the William Openshaw Street Foundation, were eligible to be matched with funds from the Cabinet Office’s Grassroots Grants Programme.
The Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy has not achieved value for money for its £100 million spend on the second competition for government financial support for carbon capture storage.
Government’s programme to transfer back-office functions to two shared service centres has made savings but has not achieved value for money to date.