Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 27
27
Accepted
Risks of double-counting efficiency savings persist with separate central and departmental reporting.
Recommendation
As part of the key principles for claiming efficiency savings, efficiencies should be carefully calculated, evidence and reported. In doing so, savings should not be double- counted and should not be reported again in future initiatives.41 We asked what witnesses were doing to ensure that savings weren’t being double counted, and whether having one process for identifying and reporting functional savings, and a different process for identifying and reporting departmental savings, created a danger that there would be two bureaucracies both working towards the same aim. The Cabinet Office told us that double- counting was checked as part of the GIAA’s review, which looked at the methodologies used to ensure that savings were not being counted in other places. It recognised, however, that with the implementation of the new Efficiency Framework, there was “perhaps more risk that a commercial saving is counted by the Cabinet Office central team and in the departmental team, because the departmental team is doing more rigorous reporting of efficiency”.42 It explained that it had highlighted this as a risk, and that it would manage this as part of implementing the new framework, but that it thought that it was a “small price to pay for the overall increase in focus and reporting on efficiency”. The Treasury similarly explained that there will be a potential for overlap and inconsistency, and that this would be part of the work it would need to undertake with its auditors to make sure that it was “doing everything we can to clean the data and get consistency over time”.43
Government Response Summary
The government agrees to drive consistency in measuring and reporting efficiencies through the GEF by December 2025, and by June 2025, the Cabinet Office will provide guidance and case study examples to functions on avoiding cost-shunting and double-counting, reporting back in Spring 2025.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Target implementation date: by December 2025 The functions’ respective methodologies for measuring and reporting efficiency savings reflect the diversity of functional activity undertaken in their respective areas. These methods range from release of cash (commercial), efficiencies baselined against projected scenarios (communications), fraud prevention, detection and recovery (counter fraud) to cash collected over business as usual (debt). The GEF will drive consistency in the way that government departments measure and report efficiencies. The GEF sets out what efficiency is, how it should be categorised, and best practice in gathering high quality information to measure and report efficiencies. The Cabinet Office and HMT are working closely together as the GEF is adopted by departments and functions. Through the adoption of the GEF, all efficiencies will be required to be reconcilable to departmental budgets and as such will avoid double counting of efficiencies by requiring common and comparable baselines. Target implementation date: end June 2025 The Cabinet Office will include case study examples of best practice for the 2023-24 efficiency and savings return guidance, showing how savings were calculated, recorded and reported. The Cabinet Office will also provide guidance to functions on how to avoid cost- shunting and double-counting, with examples. The Cabinet Office will report back to the Committee in Spring 2025. The GEF also standardises the holding and reporting of efficiency data, including for joint efficiencies, which further strengthens scrutiny not just within departments but also across departments so that cost shunting and double counting does not occur.