Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 23
24th Report - Government cyber resilience
Published 9 May 2025
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee Government cyber resilience All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
We asked the Cabinet Office how it would increase the scale and pace of GovAssure to assess the cyber resilience of all of government’s critical systems. The Cabinet Office explained that it did not plan to assess 100% 43 C&AG’s Report, paras 14, 15 44 C&AG’s Report, para 19 45 Q 39 46 Q 44 47 Q 45 14 of critical systems through GovAssure.48 This was because GovAssure was one part of a wider system of assurance, which included department’s own cyber experts as the “first line of defence”. The Cabinet Office said that it had designed GovAssure to bring consistency and share best practice, but that government must balance its effort between assurance and frontline cyber security.49 We asked if that meant the Cabinet Office was happy with the current scale and pace of GovAssure. The Cabinet Office told us it wanted to increase the number of systems it assessed and it needed to make GovAssure quicker and easier to complete for departments.50
From: Public Accounts Committee, 24th Report - Government cyber resilience (HC 643), 9 May 2025
Government response
Latest Treasury Minutes progress report to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Twenty-fourth Report of Session 2024-26
The government responded to the whole report on 4 June 2026.
Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Twenty-fourth report from Session 2024-26
Published 18 September 2025.
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government "agrees with the Committee's recommendation" in each of the six areas, setting target implementation dates between winter 2025 and autumn 2026.
- On the evolving threat, the government agrees, notes responsibility has moved to DSIT, and says DSIT will publish an implementation plan in winter 2025 and write to the Committee "in one year's time".
- On cyber skills, it "acknowledges the ongoing cyber skills gaps" and says that "Early next year" DSIT will set how many anticipated vacancies its central initiatives will address and how it will assist departments with the remaining gaps.
- On accountability and funding, DSIT will set expectations for departments to appoint a board member with cyber security and digital resilience expertise, and is "working with HMT on mechanisms for protecting budgets" for cyber and legacy remediation programmes.
- On arm's-length bodies and supply chains, it says departments remain "ultimately accountable for the risk" and that DSIT will "assure and enforce" that Accounting Officers are meeting this responsibility.