All public services have to be delivered with lower budgets and show the public that they are affordable. Where government is reducing costs it could benefit from the lessons learnt and good practice identified in the NAO's public sector work. The biggest savings are being made through complete transformation of service delivery, including digital delivery of services. Substantial savings can also be made through specific aspects of financial management, such as reducing fraud and error and better management of assets and liabilities.
There are also risks to making savings, including to long-term innovation and investment. Government needs to ensure the long-term financial and service sustainability of local services, it must maintain strong oversight of contractors, and it should ensure environmental sustainability. Performance measurement is also key to providing the information needed to make crucial decisions.
Key NAO publications:
The Ministry of Defence (the Department) publishes its Equipment Plan report each year, setting out its intended investment on equipment and support projects over the next 10 years. It assesses whether this is affordable within its future budget. The Plan includes equipment already in use, such as the Lightning II jets, and in development, such … Read more
Public service pensions are a significant part of the pensions landscape in the UK. As at 31 March 2020 the major public service pension schemes had over 8 million members, including active and deferred members, and current pensioners. Most of the main public service pension schemes are unfunded, with benefits funded from current contributions on … Read more
This report examines the MoD’s management of the programme since 2017 and the risks towards achieving Carrier Strike’s full capabilities.
The cost of clinical negligence in trusts is significant and rising fast, placing increasing financial pressure on an already stretched system.
The BBC’s approach to managing its workforce shows definite progress. It will need to monitor workforce changes carefully to build on the recent progress it has made.
Departments have continued to reduce their estates and government is now getting better value for money. The Government Property Unit, however, has not yet made much progress towards its more challenging objective of creating an integrated estate.
HMRC aimed to move more customers online thereby reducing staff costs but significant numbers of staff were let go before technical improvements were completed leading to a collapse in service quality in 2015. Services have since improved.
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.
The welfare cap is encouraging a greater understanding of spending on some benefits and tax credits across government, but it is important that processes for managing the cap are reliable.
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.
