PAC urges Whitehall to go further and faster on joined-up spending

20 Sep 13
Whitehall is not doing enough to drive the integration of public spending through Community Budgets and other schemes, according to a report published by MPs today.

By Richard Johnstone | 20 September 2013

Whitehall is not doing enough to drive the integration of public spending through Community Budgets and other schemes, according to a report published by MPs today.

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The Public Accounts Committee examined a range of attempts to break down government ‘silos’ and join up spending. As well as ‘whole place’ Community Budgets, the committee examined Department of Health efforts to better align funding for health and social care.

Its report, Integration across government and whole place Community Budgets, found there was potential to save money and improve services through better coordination of spending. However, it concluded that ‘we are still talking about proposals rather than action’.

The report warned that, if some Whitehall departments were not committed to ‘whole place’ schemes, the government may ‘fail to deliver any significant and lasting change’.

‘The programme must be evaluated properly to see whether the early promise translates to real change on the ground and improves value for money,’ MPs concluded.

Responding to the report. Local Government Association chair Sir Merrick Cockell said MPs provided ‘a ringing endorsement of the pioneering work local authorities are doing to modernise public services’. It was now down to Whitehall to rise to the ‘real challenge’ of giving Whitehall more control.

‘The success of Community Budgets is already recognised at all levels of government and this report sends a clear message that the approach must be adopted across the public sector,’ Cockell said.

‘It is high time that we stopped trying to tackle 21st century problems with an outdated highly-centralised Victorian-era bureaucracy.’

In a separate report, the PAC examined the government’s use of early intervention programmes, concluding that it represented another area where spending was not properly coordinated.

For example, the MPs found no common definition of what counts as early action, no central ownership and little capacity at the centre to drive effective delivery and share good practice.

Although there was potential for early interventions schemes to tackle the root causes of health and justice problems, previous governments had consistently failed to deliver on this promise.

The committee warned that the Treasury remained far too focused on the short term, meaning it risked missing opportunities to help stabilise public finances over the longer term through these initiatives.

Although the committee said it ‘recognised the difficulty of diverting resources from acute services to early action in a world of pressing need’, the Treasury should improve the incentives to adopt integrated public spending approaches.

Committee chair Margaret Hodge said both the committee’s reports examined ‘how government could do more for less’.

She added: ‘The need for more efficient administration in public services has never been more pressing. Strong action is essential to minimise the impact of real terms cuts in public spending on the quality of public services.

‘The central departments should take on the challenge with renewed vigour and imagination, and take responsibility for instituting change across government and holding spending departments to account.’

Two other PAC reports, covering government procurement and civil service reform, have also been published today.

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