Recommendation 9

There is no single, commonly agreed definition of a small, low-risk central government body. The NAO report classified central government or parliamentary bodies that spent up to £30 million in 2022–23 or had up to 50 full-time equivalent (FTE) employees on 31 March 2023 as small.11 HM Treasury has not endorsed this definition of small bodies and uses different definitions for different purposes. For example, it excluded government bodies with expenditure, income, assets and liabilities of less than £30 million from the Whole of Government Accounts 2023–24.12 It exempted arm’s-length bodies with up to 500 employees or total operating income and funding received up to £500 million from including Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosure (TCFD)-aligned disclosures in their annual reports and accounts.13 HM Treasury told us that, in principle, it would be preferable to identify which small bodies might be suited for simplified requirements based on their level of risk, although it noted that determining this may be complex and subjective.14