Commercial

Departments have spent billions on shared services schemes but have failed to reap the benefits, with projects often over-budget and over-customised, the National Audit Office says in a report today.

Robert Devereux has defended plans to charge single parents for work carried out by the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission (CMEC).

Public service targets still have a role to play in improving outcomes, Sir Suma Chakrabarti, permanent secretary of the Ministry of Justice has said.

The recently published Cabinet Office tender to procure digital identity assurance (IDA) services for the DWP is to be used across the whole of government, Mike Bracken, executive director of digital at the Cabinet Office has said.

Departmental select committee chairs have provided mixed reviews of the departments they scrutinise for a Civil Service World Special Report, which has found that 40 per cent of them are dissatisfied with departments’ responses to their reports.

Ministers must champion the public potential of private cash

Whitehall should better coordinate policy across health, social housing and social care services, while local commissioning bodies should integrate social care with healthcare commissioning, according to a report published today by the Commons health committee.

SMEs working in technology are to be invited to participate in a ‘product surgery’. The aim is to increase commissioners’ knowledge of products and services that could achieve the objectives laid out in the government’s ICT strategy.

The National Audit Office (NAO) has defended its report on the Department for Work and Pensions’ (DWP) Work Programme, after welfare minister Chris Grayling said that the NAO analysis was “partially based on guesswork.”