National Audit Office publish progress report for Committee of Public Accounts

The National Audit Office has today published a progress report on measures to improve the delivery of major government projects.

The projects include ICT, infrastructure and construction, with the report saying that although there have been initiatives designed to improve the oversight and delivery, their impacts are unclear. A third of projects due to deliver in the next five years have been marked as in doubt or unachievable if action is not taken to improve delivery.

The Government Major Project Portfolio contains 149 projects, with a combined whole-life cost of £511Bn, with an expected spend of £25Bn in 2015-16. These projects require Treasury approval based on their size, risk and impact.

Many more projects are delivered outside the Portfolio, for example through arm’s length bodies and other bodies such as Network Rail.

The report found that the public sector has had a poor track record in delivering projects successfully, with reports from the NAO from the last Parliament, showing project failures and other projects that were experiencing continued difficulties. Issues that were reoccurring included an absence of portfolio management on both departmental and government level, lack of clear, consistent data that could be used to measure performance, poor early planning, lack of capacity to undertake a growing number of projects and a lack of clear accountability for leadership of a project.

It was said that the Infrastructure and Projects authority have taken positive steps to develop capability and provide greater assurance on improving project delivery, although it remains difficult to measure improvements in performance without reliable and consistent measures of project success. There have been improvements in information supporting major projects, but there are still issues which make recognising trends and forming conclusions difficult. These include the amount of project turnover in the Portfolio; the limited data published by departments; inconsistent reporting of costs; and no systematic monitoring of whether the intended benefits have been achieved.

The delivery of projects where success was in doubt or unachievable in its current state were rated red and amber-red, with the report showing that the number of these projects had increased since 2012 with the increase of risky projects entering the Portfolio. Of 56 projects which remained on the Portfolio from 2012 to 2015, 17 had red or amber-red ratings in June 2015 compared with 12 in 2012, although the number of projects considered highly likely to deliver on time and on budget (rated green or amber-green) also increased from 16 in 2012 to 25 in 2015.

One third of projects (37 out of 106) that are due to be delivered in the next five years, are rated as red or amber-red.

In terms of progress in improving portfolio management, no single organisation has a view of the whole Portfolio of government projects, although the Portfolio provides increased assurance, with other central departments having an increased role in assuring, approving and improving quality of delivery. A key mechanism needs to be developed for overseeing the projects that need to be a priority, and judging whether individual departments have the capacity and capability to deliver.

Amyas Morse, Head of the National Audit Office, said today: “I acknowledge that a number of positive steps have been taken by the Authority and client departments. At the same time, I am concerned that a third of projects monitored by the Authority are red or amber-red and the overall picture of progress on project performance is opaque. More effort is needed if the success rate of project delivery is to improve.”

 

 

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