- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 10 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 24 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive why the total cash savings identified on pages 20 to 27 of Building a Better Scotland £ Efficient Government, Securing Efficiency, Effectiveness and Productivity amount to £627.7 million when £stand alone£ savings of £1.7 billion are planned.
Answer
The cash savings on pages 20-27 do not amount to £627.7 million. The savings shown from portfolios (including procurement savings from health and local government) equal £674.7 million, shown as follows:
| Portfolio | Page | Savings (£ million) |
| Administration | 20 | 8 |
| Communities | 20 | 9 |
| Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service | 21 | 3 |
| Education and Young People | 22 | 12 |
| Enterprise and Lifelong Learning | 23 | 5 |
| Environment and Rural Development | 24 | 5 |
| Scottish Water | 24 | 95 |
| Finance and Public Service Reform |
| Local Government | 24 | 325 |
| Central Government | 25 | 0.7 |
| Health | 25 | 166 |
| Justice | 26 | 30 |
| Tourism, Culture and Sport | 27 | 2 |
| Transport | 27 | 14 |
| Total | | 674.7 |
The original publication contained an error on page 26, where it stated that the Justice savings would be £28 million. The correct figure, given on page 4, is £30 million. Page 25 of the Efficient Government Plan states that, overall (including the savings from health and local government), the potential savings from procurement amount to £200 million. The outstanding £70 million required to make the total of £745 million will come from additional procurement savings in the Scottish public sector. These figures are the annually recurring cash-releasing efficiency savings from 2007-08. The figure of £1.7 billion refersto the total amount of efficiency savings that will be saved over the three yearperiod 2005-06 to 2007-08.
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 10 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 24 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive why there are no individual costings for the five areas of reform contributing to the estimate for time-releasing savings of £300 million, as referred to in Building a Better Scotland — Efficient Government, Securing Efficiency, Effectiveness and Productivity.
Answer
We will publish technical noteson the time-releasing efficiency savings projects by April 2005.
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Friday, 10 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 24 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what the terms are of the planned review of financial planning systems, as referred to in Building a Better Scotland — Efficient Government, Securing Efficiency, Effectiveness and Productivity.
Answer
Paragraph 36 of
Building aBetter Scotland: Efficient Government – Securing Efficiency, Effectiveness and Productivity statesthat the Scottish Executive is currently working to develop a new approach to long-termfinancial modelling and planning to ensure that long-term spending activity is moreeffectively aligned with corporate priorities. This has considerable potential toachieve more efficient use of public expenditure.
The terms of the project areto develop a long-term financial planning model for use within the Executive. Theintention is to develop a long-term platform to enable consistency of assumptionsand scenarios. This will enable better strategic decision making and control withinthe Executive which will allow targeting of resources to where they will achievegreatest value. The project is at an early planning stage; it will draw on expertisefrom within the public and private sector in developing the model.
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Monday, 06 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 23 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive whether, as part of the Efficient Government Review, it intends to publish an equivalent Scottish analysis to that presented in tables 4.1 and 4.2 of Sir Peter Gershon"s report, Releasing resources to the front line: Independent Review of Public Sector Efficiency and, if so, what the timetable is.
Answer
Building a Better Scotland: Efficient Government – Securing Efficiency, Effectiveness and Productivity has a table on page 4 similar to table 4.1 of the Gershon report insofar as cash-releasing savings are concerned. Paragraph 24 of the document commits the Executive to publishing technical notes on the identified projects to secure £300 million per annum of additional time-releasing efficiencies by April 2005. Table 4.2 outlines a substance list of job cuts and here in Scotland we do not believe that this is the correct way to approach this issue. We will not be producing a similar table. It does not have a table similar to table 4.2 of the Gershon report. The Scottish Executive has not set a target for job reductions in the civil service or wider Scottish public sector and does not propose to publish a table similar to that of table 4.2 in Sir Peter Gershon’s report.
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 09 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 23 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what the cumulative savings, as a percentage of the Scottish Departmental Expenditure Limit for 2007-08, are as a result of the plans referred to in Building a Better Scotland - Efficient Government, Securing Efficiency, Effectiveness and Productivity.
Answer
The Scottish Executive Departmental Expenditure Limit (DEL) for 2007-08 is £25,718 million. This excludes the Scottish Parliament, Audit Scotland and the Contingency Fund.
We have currently identified £650 million of recurring annual cash-releasing saving from within the DEL in 2007-08, which is 2.53% of the Scottish Executive DEL for 2007-08. In addition, we will make further efficiencies of £95 million a year from Scottish Water and further time and cash releasing savings.
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 09 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 23 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive what the forecast overall rates income is for 2005-06 and how this estimate compares to the most recent estimated total rates income for 2004-05, given its aim of ensuring that there is no overall increase in rates burden on businesses in 2005-06.
Answer
The current forecast of non-domestic rate income (NDRI) for 2005‑06 is £1,951 million. The most recent forecast of 2004‑05 NDRI, based on notified returns submitted by local authorities in October 2004, is £1,813 million. However it is also forecast that some £90 million of NDRI in 2005-06 will have to be refunded in future years as a result of successful appeals against new valuations.
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Thursday, 09 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 23 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-10335 by Mr Andy Kerr on 21 September 2004 on non-domestic rate income since 1996, whether it will publish comparable non-domestic rate income (NDRI) data for 2003-04 and estimated NDRI for 2004-05 and 2005-06.
Answer
Figures on a comparable basis to those in the answer to S2W-10335 are shown in the following table. The figures appearing in the budget documents contain prior year adjustments whereas the returns from local authorities are actual in-year receipts.
| Year | Budget Provision for Distributable NDRI (£) | Actual NDRI* (£) |
| 2003‑04 | 1,804,423,000 | 1,706,034,8811 |
| 2004-05 | 1,873,817,000 | |
| 2005-06 | 2,008,817,000 | |
Source: Budget Publications.
Source: Returns submitted by local authorities to the Scottish Executive.
Note: 1. Notified return (pre-audit).
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Monday, 06 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 22 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive when any Scottish-specific analysis comparable to that carried out in Sir Peter Gershon"s report, Releasing resources to the front line: Independent Review of Public Sector Efficiency, on the potential impact on jobs of planned efficiency savings will be published.
Answer
The Scottish Executive has not carried out any Scottish-specific analysis on the potential impact on jobs of planned efficiency savings. Once detailed project plans have been prepared for the implementation of Efficient Government projects, it will be possible to assess the impact on jobs.
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Monday, 06 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 22 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will follow the model in Sir Peter Gershon"s report, Releasing resources to the front line: Independent Review of Public Sector Efficiency, by publishing, department by department, efficiency savings plans to allow transparency in their delivery and, if so, what the timetable is.
Answer
The Scottish Executive will ensure transparency in the delivery of efficiency savings.
Paragraph 13 of Building a Better Scotland: Efficient Government – Securing Efficiency, Effectiveness and Productivity states that we will publish technical notes on the plans for cash-releasing savings by March 2005. Paragraph24 states that we will publish technical notes on the plans for time-releasing efficiency savings by April 2005.
Paragraph 48 states that departments and public bodies will be required to develop project plans for Efficient Government projects, which include clear milestones, identified lead and supporting roles, governance arrangements, measures for identifying and tracking benefits, and risk management.
Paragraph 51 states that individual project plans will be built into the Executive’s performance management systems. Departmental plans will set out how Efficient Government will continue to be taken forward across the Scottish public sector, and will include expectations for efficiency gains from each and every public body.
Building a Better Scotland: Efficient Government set out the right way forward for Scotland. Gershon also includes a LOOK target for civil service job cuts the Executive does not believe this is the right way to go about this.
- Asked by: Ms Wendy Alexander, MSP for Paisley North, Scottish Labour
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Date lodged: Wednesday, 08 December 2004
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Current Status:
Answered by Tom McCabe on 22 December 2004
To ask the Scottish Executive whether it will publish a table of planned savings on a comparable basis to that in HM Treasury SR 2004 Statement, itemising planned savings as a result of its Efficient Government plans.
Answer
The Scottish Executive published a table of cash-releasing efficiency savings, by portfolio, on page 4 of
Building a Better Scotland: Efficient Government – Securing Efficiency, Effectiveness and Productivity. Paragraph 24 of thedocument commits the Executive to publishing technical notes on the identified projects to secure £300 million per annum of additional time-releasing efficiencies by April 2005.
The responsibilities of Scottish portfolios differ considerably from UK Government Departments since UK Government Departments are responsible for areas of policy that are reserved to Westminster. Furthermore, we are taking a different approach to our efficiency review. As the responsibilities for the Scottish Executive portfolios and UK Departments are different and we are both taking different approaches to our efficiency review, it would serve no usefulpurpose to draw a direct comparison.
