Recommendation 15

We asked why the Department is forecasting to spend more than its capital budget in seven of the next 10 years. The Department responded that the differences in those years were quite small and it judged them to be manageable.32 It had taken a conscious decision not to fully “address that pressure”, in order to balance financial and capability risk, given available contingency and the remaining uncertainties in costings and delivery schedules.33 Cost control of the Plan’s largest programmes