Download or read book Excess Votes 2012 13 HC 1068 written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2014-04-30 with total page 20 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Committee of Public Accounts scrutinises the reasons behind individual departments exceeding their allocated resources, and reports to the House of Commons on whether it has any objection to the amounts needed to rectify the reported excesses. In 2012-13 two bodies breached their expenditure limits: the Department for Communities and Local Government and the Food Standards Agency. The Ministry of Defence also required a token increase because of a Defence Votes A excess. On the basis of the examination of the reasons why these bodies exceeded their voted, the Committee has no objection to Parliament providing the necessary amounts by means of an Excess Vote. Nevertheless, it expects the Department for Communities and Local Government to set out what actions it has taken to improve their financial management and avoid exceeding their allocated resources in the future. And, as recommended last year, HM Treasury, as the UK's Ministry of Finance, should ensure departments are fully aware of the need to operate within their voted provisions. HM Treasury should continue to regularly monitor the progress departments are making against their Estimates during the year and, where possible, take appropriate action to prevent departments exceeding their provision.

Download or read book The Work of the Committee In 2008 09 written by and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2009 with total page 108 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: work of the Committee In 2008-09 : First report of session 2009-10, report, together with formal minutes, and written Evidence

Download or read book Sessional returns written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010-01-27 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On cover and title page: House, committees of the whole House, general committees and select committees

Download or read book HM Revenue and Customs written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010-03-25 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: HM Revenue and Customs' performance in responding to calls has been poor. In 2008-09, HMRC answered only 57 per cent of the 103 million calls to its main helplines, compared to an industry standard of 95 per cent; callers waited on average two minutes, and nearly four minutes in peak periods to speak to an advisor; and yet contact centre staff spent only 38 per cent of their time handling calls against an industry benchmark of 60 per cent. HMRC has set a target to answer more than 90 per cent of calls by March 2012, but achieving this would still fall short of best practice. It could do more to reduce the confusion caused by having 139 telephone numbers. A total of 6.8 million calls failed accuracy checks in 2008-09 because advisors did not follow guidance and procedures, but HMRC does not know how often the advice it provides by telephone is actually incorrect. HMRC could also match staffing levels more closely to levels of demand, as the number of calls fluctuates significantly around key statutory deadlines during the year. There are also significant opportunities to reduce costs and improve its responsiveness by reducing the number of unnecessary calls. HMRC estimates that 35 per cent of calls are avoidable, often from people seeking to clarify information they had received which they did not understand, or chasing progress on items being processed in other parts of the department.

Download or read book Vehicle and Operator Services Agency written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010-03-11 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This report examines the extent to which the Vehicle and Operator Services Agency (the Agency) is effective in targeting high risk vehicles and whether its approach to enforcement is appropriate for today's world. The Agency has successfully increased by over 25 per cent the number of dangerous vehicles and drivers that it removed from the roads in recent years. There is scope to do better by bringing the Agency's working practices up to date to reflect current road traffic patterns and the opportunities afforded by technology and working with others. More needs to be done to address the significant risk to road safety posed by foreign commercial vehicles. They appear to contribute little in the way of revenue and pose a particular challenge in terms of enforcing regulations. The Department for Transport and the Agency have not done enough to secure access to HM Revenue and Customs' Freight Targeting Database which would allow the Agency to target non-compliant vehicles and drivers as they enter the country and so prevent them from travelling on Britain's roads. The Agency needs to develop its targeting systems further so that they reflect better the known risks to road safety. Likewise the location of staff and checksites needs to reflect more closely current traffic patterns. The Department's new Heavy Goods Vehicle (HGV) compliance strategy is under development and provides an opportunity to make better use of data to analyse risk and to target resources more effectively.

Download or read book Hm Revenue and Customs Estate Private Finance Deal Eight Years On written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A NAO report published as HC 30, Session 2009-10.

Download or read book Ministry of Defence written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010-03-29 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since October 2001 565 service men and women have been seriously injured in Iraq and Afghanistan, some 125,000 troops based there have sought medical help for minor injuries and illnesses, and a further 1,700 for mental health conditions. Nearly all seriously injured troops who return back to the UK for medical treatment go first to the NHS hospital at Selly Oak and then to Headley Court for rehabilitation. The care of the seriously injured to date has been highly effective, and support for the families of seriously injured troops is good. The main challenge the Department faces, should casualties increase significantly, is to ensure that all military patients will receive the same standard of care they currently experience at Selly Oak and Headley Court. Some soldiers have suffered severe life changing injuries and will require specialist care for many years. This presents a further long term challenge not only for the Department who provide specialist care for them and support for their families while they remain in the Services, but also for the NHS and other government departments who will become responsible for the medical care and support of seriously injured soldiers after they leave the Armed Forces. Minor injury and illness are a lesser issue but still have the potential to impact on the fighting strength and morale of our Armed Forces in Afghanistan and the increase in rates from 4 to 7 per cent since 2006 is of concern.

Download or read book Department for Business Innovation and Skills written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010-03-09 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since 2000 the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (the Department) and its predecessors have invested public money, alongside private investors, in a series of funds managed by private sector fund managers. The funds provide support to small businesses unlikely to receive support from other sources. The programme currently comprises 28 funds. By December 2009 taxpayers had contributed £338 million, alongside £438 million from private investors. The Department's intervention in the venture capital market was experimental and risky, yet it did not set clear, prioritised objectives for the funds, including the expected economic benefits, and did not set targets at the outset for expected rates of return. The Department did not begin to properly evaluate the progress of its early funds until late 2008 and, to the concern of the Committee, did not publish any information on the funds until December 2009. The evidence suggests that the funds are underperforming. As at December 2008 the Regional Venture Capital Funds, the largest category of early funds, showed negative returns and the average rate of return was minus 15.7 per cent whilst private European venture capital funds of a similar size had an average rate of return of minus 0.4 per cent. The Department has not done enough to curtail the high costs of managing the funds. Fees for the Regional Venture Capital Funds have totalled £46 million compared to the £130 million invested. Substantial fees have been paid to fund managers even though the performance of the funds has been poor.

Download or read book Department for Work and Pensions written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010-03-17 with total page 38 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This report examines the action the Department for Work and Pensions is taking to tackle overpayment and stem the rising trend in benefit debt; improve its knowledge of its client base; and set realistic targets to improve debt collection and improve write-off. The Department has increased cash recoveries from £180 million in 2005-06 to £281 million in 2008-09. However, yet again, evidence proves that the Department needs to significantly improve how it makes benefit payments, it adds. The total amount of money owed to the Department as the result of benefit overpayments is now £1.85 billion and is rising as recoveries are not keeping pace with the increase in referrals. Helping customers avoid getting into debt is important for both the Department and its customers in managing their finances, and the increasing total level of debt reflects the difficulty of recovering money once overpayments have occurred. Overpayments arising from Income Support accounted for over 70 per cent of all debts at 31 March 2008. It is critical that the Department improves its debt prevention procedures and intervenes more directly to check that the circumstances of customers have not changed. In 2007-08, some £9.3 million of small overpayments below £65 were written off because the Department considered them too small to justify the cost of recovery action. But the Department does not distinguish between different types of debtor or different recovery routes in assessing whether the costs of recovery are likely to outweigh the benefits.

Download or read book The Department for Business Innovation and Skills written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This report examines the experience to date of delivering the debt advice project, and how the overall strategy for support to the over-indebted has been managed. Consumer debt stands at around £1,500 billion, and some 11% of the UK population struggle to manage their debts. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills shares responsibility for co-ordinating the strategy with the Department for Work and Pensions and the Ministry of Justice, and is responsible for the strategy's evaluation. There has been a complete failure to manage delivery of the strategy. Since 2006 the Department has also managed a project to provide face-to-face advice for those struggling with debt. The £130 million project is funded primarily from the Treasury's Financial Inclusion Fund, and delivered locally by Citizens Advice and other third sector organisations. Whilst greater success has been achieved in managing this particular project, which is delivering more debt advice than planned at a lower cost per person than budgeted, the project is currently unable to meet all the demand from those users it is intended to help. More people could be reached if the Department better understood consumer needs, the effectiveness of different methods of delivering debt advice, and the most efficient ways of providing advice. In addition, much debt advice is already provided by the private sector and the Department needs to consider both the quality of the advice provided and the contribution that private sector advice could make in the future.

Download or read book The Department for Transport written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2009 with total page 52 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 2005, the Department for Transport took over responsibility for passenger rail franchising from the Strategic Rail Authority. Eight franchises, half of the 16 franchises currently in operation across the country, have been re-let, with the train operator on six out of the eight franchises being changed. The Department specifies the minimum levels and quality of passenger services and agrees annual levels of subsidy or premium which it will pay to, or receive from, each train operator for franchise terms of typically 7-10 years. It has announced plans to add a total of 1,300 additional rail carriages to operator fleets across all 16 franchises to reduce overcrowding. In January 2009, the average increase of unregulated fares was 7 per cent, with some as high as 20 per cent. Special low fare offers are available, often through the internet, but those without access to a computer may need help to identify and book these fares. The Department projected that taxpayer support for the eight franchises would reduce and, in five cases, turn into payments from the train operators. If the projections are realised, a direct subsidy of £811 million to train operators in 2006-07 would be replaced by a £326 million receipt from train operators in 2011-12. Grants to Network Rail, if kept at the 2005-06 level, would mean passenger services receiving £926 million of support from the taxpayer in 2011-12, reduced from about £2,063 million in 2005-06. This reflects a policy of rebalancing service costs, with a higher proportion for the passenger and an overall reduction in subsidy. This outcome depends more on continued rail passenger growth than on fare increases.

Download or read book Department for Transport written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010-03-02 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 2003, the Government entered into three innovative 30 year contracts with private sector contractors to upgrade London's underground rail system. Four years later, in 2007, two of the three contractors (Metronet BCV and Metronet SSL, known collectively as Metronet) went into administration when they could no longer meet their spending obligations. The loss to the taxpayer arising from Metronet's poor financial control and inadequate corporate governance is some £170 million to £410 million. The Department's oversight and management of risk on the Metronet contracts were inadequate, especially given that it provided a £1 billion a year grant, was ultimately responsible for delivery and carried the majority of the risk of failure. These failings ignored a clear warning from the National Audit Office in 2004 that they should avoid taking a 'hands-off' approach to oversight. The Department undermined its assumption that lenders would exercise strong oversight by assuring them that it would meet 95 per cent of the outstanding debt in the event of failure. The public sector parties to the contract were unable to obtain the information they needed to oversee the contract effectively. A serious weakness in the arrangements was that the independent Public Private Partnerships (PPP) Arbiter was not invited to act at the earliest opportunity, rendering him largely ineffective. The Department must learn from its mistakes, have the right commercial skills in place and perform robust risk analysis when negotiating such contracts, to monitor the risks thereafter, and be prepared to intervene where necessary.

Download or read book Protecting the Public written by House of Commons Public Accounts Committ and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2009 with total page 56 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Parole Board (the Board), a Non-Departmental Public Body sponsored by the Ministry of Justice, is responsible for deciding whether an offender is suitable for release from custody on parole. The Board's workload of cases to assess has more than doubled in a five year period. The balance has also shifted from more straightforward paper based hearings to more resource intensive oral hearings, where the offender attends and is questioned. This increase in workload stems from the rising prison population and new sentencing regimes. The Board's administrative performance is undermined by a lack of capacity to hear cases, and it often does not receive the key information required to make their assessment on serious offenders. The Prison and probation services have been unable to provide the timely and complete information necessary for the efficient and effective running of the parole process. There are further problems with the oral hearings: two-thirds of oral hearings have not been held in their planned month and 20 per cent of hearings have been held more than 12 months late. These delays are unacceptable and costly - direct costs of £1 million in 2007-07, and nearly £2 million costs to the Prison Service in keeping offenders who should have been released or transferred to open conditions. These costs are significant when set against the Board's net expenditure in 2007-8 of £7.4 million, and the Board needs to administer hearings more effectively. The Board should also be more independent, and its membership more accurately reflect the composition of society.

Download or read book Tackling Problem Drug Use written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2010 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are 330,000 problem drug users in England. They are estimated, based on research covering the 2003-04 period, to cost society over £15 billion a year, £13.9 billion of which is due to drug-related crime. Fully one quarter of all problem drug users are hard-core offenders for whom drug treatment is ineffective and, indeed, whose offending has sharply increased after entering treatment. It is of particular concern that measures to cut problem drug use by young people are having limited effect. Preventing the young from descending into problem drug use is an essential part of bringing down the number of problem drug users in future. In 2008, the Government introduced a 10 year cross-departmental drug strategy to tackle problem drug use, which it defined as use of opiates (mainly heroin) and/or crack cocaine. The Home Office has overall responsibility for the strategy, with a number of other government departments and agencies, at national, regional and local levels, sharing responsibility for its delivery. Central and local government collectively spend £1.2 billion a year to deliver the measures set out in the strategy. Given the public money spent on the strategy and the cost to society it is unacceptable that there has not been sufficient evaluation of the programme of measures in the strategy and that it is not known if the strategy is directly reducing the overall cost of drug-related crimes. Following a recommendation made by the National Audit Office, the Home Office has agreed to produce an overall framework to evaluate and report on the value for money achieved from the strategy, with initial results from late 2011.

Download or read book Report written by India. Parliament. Public Accounts Committee and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 608 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Hm Revenue and Customs written by House of Commons Public Accounts Commi and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2009-03-24 with total page 52 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this report the Committee of Public Accounts examines HM Revenue and Customs' (the Department) administration of tax credits and also examines the Department on its collection of income tax through PAYE and Self Assessment. The Department overpaid £7.3 billion in the first four years of the tax credits scheme and underpaid more than £2.0 billion. By the end of March 2008, it had collected £2.7 billion (37 per cent) of this debt and written off £1 billion (14 per cent). £3.6 billion of the total of overpayments are outstanding and the Department is unlikely to recover £1.8 billion. Overpayments continue to affect many people, including some of the most vulnerable in society. Claimants are not given the support they need in making claims and too much is assumed on the part of claimants in their understanding the complex tax credits system. Tax credits suffer from high rates of error and fraud: in 2006-07 claimant error and fraud is estimated to have led to incorrect payments of between £1.31 billion and £1.54 billion. In 2007-08, the Department collected £225 billion in income tax and national insurance contributions through the Pay As You Earn (PAYE) system. The planned transfer of the administration of PAYE to its National Insurance Recording System has been delayed, adding to the backlog of tax cases - currently 16 million - that must be checked manually. In 2007-08, the Department collected £30.2 billion (net) through the Self Assessment system. A total of 46 per cent of Self Assessment returns were filed online, significantly exceeding the 35 per cent target, though some 34 per cent of filed returns may be inaccurate, putting between £2.9 billion to £3.7 billion tax at risk.

Download or read book Building Schools for the Future written by Great Britain: Parliament: House of Commons: Committee of Public Accounts and published by The Stationery Office. This book was released on 2009-06-11 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Department for Children, Schools and Families' Building Schools for the Future Programme (BSF) plans to renew every secondary school in the country, by rebuilding half of them, structurally remodelling 35 per cent, refurbishing 15 per cent and providing Information Communication Technology to all. Its aim is to use capital investment in new buildings as a catalyst to improve educational outcomes. The Department estimates that the programme will cost £52-£55 billion over its lifetime. The Department was over-optimistic in its original planning assumptions for BSF: of the 200 schools originally planned to be completed by December 2008, only 42 had been by that date. The Department now expects the programme to take 18 years, with the last school completed in 2023. Local authorities are responsible for the local delivery of BSF. They plan, procure and manage the BSF school buildings. In 2004, the Department established Partnerships for Schools to manage the national delivery of the programme. The Department and Partnerships for Schools encourage local authorities to procure their schools through a Local Education Partnership. These are 10-year partnerships to procure a flow of projects, structured as joint ventures between the local authority, a consortium of private companies that build, finance and maintain schools, and Building Schools for the Future Investments. It is too early to conclude whether BSF will achieve its educational objectives. To date, over-optimism has meant the programme could not live up to expectations. Establishing Partnerships for Schools to manage the programme centrally has helped local authorities to deliver more effectively, but while Local Education Partnerships have potential advantages, their value for money is yet to be proven. And it will be very challenging to deliver all schools by 2023.