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Government says it'll deliver £5bn in operational efficiency this year

Posted by Gary Flood on Fri, 17/02/2012 - 13:43
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Ongoing tough controls in property, procurement, ICT and staffing by the Cabinet Office looks set to raise 2011’s £3.75bn in cash savings to £5bn this.
 
This is the claim from Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude, who said this week efficiency drives have already garnered £3.25bn, while work carried out to uncover waste in areas such as fraud, error and debt mean that projected savings for the full financial year are anticipated to be around £5bn.
 
A minor component in the overall big figure but still important: a £140m cull of ICT costs, says his team.
 
“There can and will be no turning back in the ongoing hunt to root out waste in Whitehall and cut costs to protect frontline services,” said the Minister.
 
“Our new business-like approach and steely determination to get value for taxpayer money means we now expect to make £5bn in cash savings by the time this financial year is out.”
 
The Cabinet Office adds that, “like any large business,; Whitehall also now has an effective “operations centre at the heart of government - one that will keep delivering savings for the taxpayer year after year”.
 
Savings have been made by: 
  • A £130m reduction in the ongoing cost of government property estate by exerting better control over lease renewals and the portfolio has also been reduced to the equivalent of 58 Wembley Stadium pitches
  • A £1.1bn claw-back by cutting Departmental spend on consulting and temporary agency staff, a move “equivalent to 50,000 junior nurses [and] 35,000 secondary school teachers”
  • £140m saved by demanding “for the first time’ a rigorous business case for any significant ICT spend and only allowing it where it is absolutely necessary to bring government in line with standard business practices
  • £295m saved by centralising spend on common goods and services
  • £100m saved on travel costs within the Civil Service through driving better deals, using cheaper modes of travel, and reducing the number of journeys made.
  • An equivalent of £800m saved on salary costs by reducing the size of the Civil Service by putting stronger controls on non-essential recruitment – we now have the smallest mandarin body since the Second World War. 
Next phases to save even more include “ending the days of large, costly projects that don’t deliver” via the Major Projects Authority and imminent Major Projects Academy, “fast-tracking the digital revolution by establishing a Government Digital Service to move more services online” and increasing levels of public accountability in public sector bodies by making public more data than any previous government.
 

And while we haven’t heard of it for a while, the Big Society still gets a nodas part of extra measures planned: “creating new delivery models, such as our work to establish mutuals and joint-venture businesses, and to open existing public services up to greater competition from the private and voluntary sectors”.