20 October 2006
The government's efficiency programme will protect future investment in public services at adequate levels rather than rob them of vital resources, the Cabinet minister masterminding it has insisted.
Chief Secretary to the Treasury Stephen Timms said the Gershon efficiency agenda, rather than posing a threat to frontline services, would in fact underpin the drive to improve them.
Timms, addressing the Govnet Expo in London on October 18, argued that boosting efficiency was the best way to secure adequate funding for major services in years to come.
'Efficiency sometimes requires tough choices, but it is the friend of public service. We have to be able to give taxpayers confidence that the resources they are contributing to fund public services are being used to the best possible effect,' he told delegates. 'Only in that way will we be able to win the argument for the resources which enable strong, high-quality public services.'
Timms added that public bodies were making 'good progress' towards the target of £21.5bn annual savings by 2008.
As at March this year, £9.8bn worth of efficiency gains had been achieved and 45,500 civil service posts had been scrapped, against a target of 84,000.
In the same session John Oughton, chief executive of the Office of Government Commerce, said that rigorous measurement systems for quantifying the savings had been developed.
Flaws in the methodology were one of the principal criticisms in the National Audit Office's February report on the Gershon programme.
'We are much more confident that all departments will be reporting accurately and the data will be much more sound,' Oughton said.
PFoct2006
