Recommendation 8

As part of our inquiry into the 2019–20 Whole of Government Accounts, we concluded that the Treasury had taken too long to deliver the accounts, having been unrealistic with its timetable. We recommended that the Department reviewed the causes of its optimism bis, and revisited future timetables to ensure that they were realistic. The Treasury accepted our recommendation, and committed to revising the timetable for the 2020–21 account and future cycles. It also committed to setting out a long term recovery strategy that was realistic.8 In our previous evidence session on the 2019–20 WGA, HM Treasury said that it aimed to deliver the 2020–21 and 2021–22 accounts for publication of March 2023 and November 2023 respectively. However, in October 2022, the Treasury wrote to tell us that a March 2023 publication now looked unlikely.9 The Treasury wrote to us again in December 2022 to provide a further update on the timetable for the delivery of future WGAs, which it expected to published in quarter three of 2023.10 5 Public Accounts Committee, Whole of Government Accounts 2019–20, Twentieth Report of Session 2022–23, HC 31, 14 October 2022 6 HM Treasury, The Whole of Government Accounts (Specified Dates) Order 2010, 2010 No. 570, 31 March 2010 7 Q 1; WGA 2020–21, para 11, p 264; and HM Treasury, Whole of Government Accounts: year ended 31 March 2020, HC 246, June 2022 8 Committee of Public Accounts, Whole of Government Accounts 2019–20, Twentieth Report of Session 2022–23, HC 31, 14 October 2022; and HM Treasury, Government Response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Eighteenth to the Twenty-Second Reports from Session 2022–23, CP 774, 12 December 2022 9 Correspondence from Catherine Little, Director General, Public Spending HM Treasury, re Whole of Government Accounts (WGA), dated 4 October 2022, published 17 October 2022 10 Correspondence from Catherine Little, Second Permanent Secretary Head of Government Finance Function, HM Treasury, re Whole of Government Ac