Government efforts to improve the quality and take-up of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) skills have yielded some positive results but there remains an urgent need for departments to set out a shared view of what they are trying to achieve and a co-ordinated plan for achieving it.
This report examines the Home Office’s progress in managing a clear assurance and oversight system for police forces’ financial sustainability.
This report reviews whether the Ministry of Defence has an effective approach to developing the capability of its regular forces, and how it is adapting to meet the new challenges.
Departments have acted quickly to reduce staff numbers and this should bring significant savings. To sustain these savings, and deliver long-term value for money improvements, staff numbers must stay at these reduced levels and departments must develop new ways of working.
This report summarises our progress over the first year of the 2015-2018 strategy. As part of our commitment to the Public Sector Equality Duty we also publish equality data in a separate report.
Government has gaps in its capability and must do more to develop the skills needed. It is making plans, but the scale of the challenge means greater urgency is needed.
This page is part of our decommissioning toolkit. Decommissioning is not the same as cuts. Cuts are usually decisions taken simply on the basis of reducing the costs of service provision, while decommissioning is a process which, while sometimes leading to the stopping of services, can mitigate the potentially damaging effects of cuts. Although the […]
This report examines whether the government is likely to meet its ambitions for children and young people’s mental health services.
On 15 January 2018, Carillion declared insolvency and the Official Receiver, an employee of the Insolvency Service, started to liquidate its assets and contracts. This report focuses on the role of the UK government in preparing for and managing the liquidation of Carillion.
The Audit Commission and the National Audit Office today published the results of their comprehensive joint review of education and training for existing and trainee nurses, midwives and other healthcare staff. Getting the development of these staff right is fundamental to meeting patients’ needs, improving services, reducing risks and modernising the NHS. The reports make […]
Value for money is not being achieved across all trusts in the planning, procurement and use of high value equipment. There are significant variations across England in levels of activity and a lack of comparable information about performance and cost of machine use.
This report examines the progress made by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Competition and Markets Authority, and National Trading Standards in building the UK’s legal framework and capacity and capability in consumer protection, competition and state aid.
Amyas Morse, Comptroller and Auditor General has qualified his audit opinions on the National College for Teaching and Leadership’s (NCTL) 2016-17 Accounts due to a limitation in the scope of his audit of the regularity of the NCTL’s grant expenditure.
11 January 2018
The Comptroller and Auditor General, Amyas Morse, has today qualified the accounts of High Speed Two (HS2) Limited owing to its running a redundancy scheme at enhanced terms without the necessary approvals.
This report summarises our progress over the third year of the 2012-2015 strategy. As part of our commitment to the Public Sector Equality Duty we also publish equality data in our separate ‘Equality Information’ report.
There are shortcomings in how the supply of NHS clinical staff in England is managed, in terms of both planning the future workforce and meeting the current demand for staff.
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.
There has been much public discussion about the affordability of public service pensions. To inform that debate, the National Audit Office has today published a report designed to bring greater transparency to, and understanding of, the cash costs involved. Today’s report found: Total payments to more than 2 million pensioners in the UK’s four largest […]
This briefing complements the Departmental Overview prepared for the Department for International Development and covers specific topics of particular interest to the International Development Committee, including trends in DFID’s expenditure and total UK Official Development Assistance; and the Department’s progress in managing the delivery of the government’s target to spend 0.7 per cent of gross national income on UK Official Development Assistance in 2013.
The government’s approach to managing the risks to schools’ financial sustainability cannot be judged to be effective or providing value for money until more progress is made.