Gerard Murphy
Ceist:105 Mr. Murphy asked the Minister for Finance his views on whether the public is getting value for the increase in public spending in the past two years. [21321/02]
Written Answers. - Public Expenditure.
I am satisfied that increases in public spending over the past two years have led to considerable improvements in the quality and quantity of public services, particularly in the key priority areas of health, education, social welfare and infrastructure. There are a number of procedures in place to assess value for money, including reviews conducted by individual Departments under the expenditure review initiative, Comptroller and Auditor General value for money audits and national development plan evaluations of spending.
Notwithstanding the procedures already in place, I am determined to ensure a greater focus on value for money. In this regard, I would point to a number of initiatives which should assist in more comprehensive evaluation of spending in the future: the Commission on Health Services Funding was established to examine the financial management and control structures in the health services, with particular emphasis on securing arrangements which will enable budget holders to manage within agreed resources and achieve a cost efficient delivery of services; An audit of structures and functions is being undertaken; the continuing development of the management information framework, MIF, will put in place an important tool to enable Departments to more effectively monitor and assess value for money aspects of their spending; the further development of the expenditure review process will focus on significant areas of spending and will also address cross-cutting reviews; and the mid-term evaluation of the national development plan in 2003 will evaluate all spending under the plan. NDP expenditure accounts for nearly 80% of voted capital spending and about 14% of voted current spending. Each individual operational programme is also subject to evaluation; proposals are currently being developed by my Department to improve policy analysis and evaluation capacity across the Civil Service; and a review of the guidelines for the appraisal and management of capital expenditure is also under way in my Department.
I am confident that these measures will, over time, improve the evaluation of effectiveness of spending across the Civil Service. I am aware, however, that more needs to be done. The management information framework which I referred to above will facilitate the development of output information linked to specific performance indicators. My Department is currently exploring with other Departments measures to more effec tively integrate the business planning function with resource allocation. Revised arrangements for reporting on results achieved are also being examined.