Examination of witnesses (Questions 420
- 439)
WEDNESDAY 14 JUNE 2000
SIR RICHARD
MOTTRAM, MR
JOHN BALLARD,
MR TOM
ADAMS and MR
ALAN EVANS
Mrs Gorman
420. You refer to the Urban Task Force. Do you
agree with them about the 65 per cent going on the walking and
all the rest of it, or do you believe that we are not spending
anything like enough money to meet what most people want, which
is a motor car?
(Sir Richard Mottram) What the Urban Task Force says,
without getting into the detail of their individual recommendations,
whether it is 65 per cent or not, because we will be responding
to their recommendations in due course in the Urban White Paper,
is that when you think about the state of our cities and towns
we need a different approach towards transport and the environment
and we need to give priority to certain categories of people,
such as pedestrians, we need to give priority to road safety,
and so you get stuff about home zones and so on. The Department
has a lot of sympathy for the approach which the Urban Task Force
takes to the need to get the right balance between transport and
non-transport considerations and the planning of cities and in
the way in which individuals are treated within cities. This is
not to be interpreted as therefore we are against cars or that
we do not need to make provision for the use of cars where cars
make a lot of sense. Cars make a lot of sense in rural areas,
cars make a lot of sense for lots of longer journeys. What we
want to do is to give people more choice however in relation to
all those journeys.
421. What evidence does your Department have
that it is the motorist that is mainly using the road as opposed
to people delivering services to people in urban areas, which
can only use the roads? I am thinking about vans and lorries.
(Sir Richard Mottram) Obviously we have to make provision
for people to deliver services. Nobody is suggesting we should
not.
422. You need one set of roads, whether the
motorist is on it or whether the service industries are on it.
(Sir Richard Mottram) Yes, but I think we would all
agree that if we think about the road network we would give priority
to the people who are delivering the services.
Mr O'Brien
423. Sir Richard, could I move on to public
service agreements and targets that were set in the Comprehensive
Spending Review two years ago? Having regard to the fact that
the Government is saying now to local authorities that their funding
could be allied to their performance, is the same going to apply
to your Department?
(Sir Richard Mottram) Can I ask John Ballard to start
off on that one?
(Mr Ballard) There are two aspects to this. One is
that when the PSAs were drawn up and published in December 1998
it was made very clear in that document published by the Government
that there would not be a direct link between performance and
the availability of resources over the CSR period because the
underlying objective there was to give a degree of certainty so
that people could plan for three years. Having said that, obviously
if Departments fail to deliver or targets are not met, then that
is something which is the subject of analysis and discussion because
the performance of the Departments against targets is monitored
on a regular quarterly basis both within the Department but also
we are accountable to
424. Can I just put my question again? Is the
Government considering the performance of Departments?
(Mr Ballard) The Chief Secretary said in reply to
the Treasury Select Committee last November that it would be considering
how performance would lead into the availability of resources
in the longer term. This is only a factor to be taken into account.
425. Have there been any references to what
penalties will be payable if they do not meet those targets?
(Mr Ballard) What he has said is that he is considering
it. Obviously it is a factor that is played into the current spending
review. In the dialogues that go between Departments obviously
one of the factors taken into account is the extent to which Departments
are delivering, whether they are not delivering, why they are
not delivering.
426. The same thing applies in local government
too. In local government they have problems, just like the Government
have, with NHS and with education. Local authorities have problems
with social services where there is a greater demand for their
services, and yet we are saying to local government that their
expenditure will be allied to their performance. Why are we not
doing that with Government Departments?
(Mr Ballard) What I have said is that this is a factor
to be taken into account. What we are doing is making Departments
accountable both internally to Ministers collectively but also
to you and to people outside through the publication of our performance
against targets. In our case in the departmental annual report
we are setting out the degree to which we are meeting our targets.
As it happens I think we are on target on the whole pretty well.
427. Has there been any suggestion as to what
penalties will apply if Departments or even departments within
the Department do not meet their targets?
(Mr Ballard) The straight answer is that there is
not a scheduled penalty that will be applied because the Government
has made it clear that this is not a mechanistic process. What
you need to do in the first instance is to have a proper information
base which is what the PSA monitoring system is intended to deliver,
so you actually understand why these things are happening. When
you know how they are happening you then decide what action you
want to take to correct it.
428. Your Department is responsible mainly for
local government?
(Sir Richard Mottram) Yes.
429. Is the same thing going to apply, that
we are going to look at the way that local government is performing,
that they will be able to submit their reasons why targets have
not been met and will that be given favourable consideration by
your Department?
(Sir Richard Mottram) Yes, because what we are proposing
to do in relation to local government is two sets of things. One
is in place and one we are thinking about. The regime that is
in place is a regime of best value where there is an active dialogue
with local government, where there is inspection and so on, about
performance in relation to what they are seeking to achieve. In
relation to local government there is, for the same reasons as
in relation to central government, caution about, if you do not
perform, taking money away if that money would have gone for a
service that people need. If you have got a poorly performing
education authority, for example, it is not logical that you should
take the money away so that the children in those schools are
themselves punished for a failure of the architecture above them.
The right answer there would be to think about how the thing is
being managed. Similarly, in relation to central government, I
think there are two dimensions. One is thinking about what the
outcomes are that you are trying to achieve and whether what a
department is trying to do in relation to those outcomes actually
stacking up and contributing. If it is not, then I think the Treasury
would say, "We will stop spending that money, so we will
stop seeking to achieve those outputs if they do not deliver against
the outcome", and then there is a stronger culture I suppose
of holding us all to account for individual performance in delivering,
so there are clearer arrangements with departments, individuals
within departments, "Did you deliver against what you were
saying you were going to do?". For example, all of our PSA
targets in the departmental Annual Report are allocated out to
individuals and we spend a lot of time watching performance in
relation to those targets.
430. So we will come back to this in the future?
(Sir Richard Mottram) Yes.
Mr Gray
431. Why is there no PSA relating to the urban
renaissance?
(Sir Richard Mottram) I think there are PSAs that
relate to aspects of the urban renaissance, like for example the
use of brownfield land.
(Mr Ballard) There are a number of plans that the
PSA targets do actually contribute to, so 60 per cent over 10
years to be brownfield sites is one. The commitment to modernising
the planning system is another.
(Sir Richard Mottram) The problem with all PSAs, and
obviously this is a more general problem we are facing with the
spending review, is to try and frame meaningful targets which
people can understand which try to capture these things, so framing
a target to capture the urban renaissance is quite a difficult
thing to do.
432. That is right, but those two you have mentioned
are the only two I think and there are quite a number of other
things which come to the Urban Task Force, like for example higher
densities for building and better car parking, a number of changes
in the Urban Task Force which are not featured, and in particular
there is a specific recommendation for the Urban Task Force that
you should have a PSA specifically related to urban renaissance.
Is that something you are considering?
(Sir Richard Mottram) It is something we are considering
but it is not something where I would say with confidence that
I think I could frame it.
433. If that is right surely this shows you
as pretty half-hearted? You have got PSAs with regard to almost
anything else apart from urban renaissance. Probably one of the
most important things for the people of Britain is urban renaissance,
saving our countryside and rebuilding our cities. We have not
got one.
(Sir Richard Mottram) What we are talking about is
targets. There are three dimensions to this. One is that there
is pressure on us to have a comprehensive set of these targets.
Secondly, there is a lot of concern that we have too many targets,
and thirdly, in framing the targets they are supposed to be `SMART',
that is, they are supposed to be things that actually people would
understand what they meant and they could go out and achieve them.
They are challenging but achievable.
Mrs Dunwoody
434. So you are sorting them out and throwing
half of them away?
(Sir Richard Mottram) No. I can come on to what we
are trying to do. I would be very happy to have a PSA target for
the urban renaissance. I have not yet discovered a way in which
I could frame it.
Mr Gray
435. I am sure Lord Rogers could come up with
quite a number. If funding is going to be linked into it in the
future and you have not got a PSA presumably for urban renaissance,
is there to a danger that urban regeneration money will therefore
be damaged because if you can prove that we are doing frightfully
well on countryside things or we are doing frightfully well on
housing things but the urban renaissance does not have one, is
there to a risk that if they are not in the spending review they
will lose out as well?
(Sir Richard Mottram) There is such a risk, yes. The
Committee may think this is easy. I have not yet myself managed
to find easy ways of doing this. What we are trying to do is to
have a limited number of public service agreement targets backed
up by more detailed targets in what is called the service delivery
agreement, the SDA.
Mrs Dunwoody
436. So we are moving away from PSA to SDA?
(Sir Richard Mottram) Yes, and the reason why we are
having the PSA and SDA is precisely that there was a lot of criticism
that our Department for instance had too many high level targets,
so we are trying to reduce the number. We are trying to ensure
that the number of high level targets we have do capture key elements
of what we do where you can actually measure performance and set
a smart target. We have argued consistently that we must not assume
that the only things that Departments do are the things covered
by PSA and SDA targets because if they do, and if we are all personally
incentivised in relation to central targets set, I think the danger
that you have referred to arises, that you chase the targets.
We are trying to tiptoe our way through what is quite a difficult
and complicated area.
Mr Gray
437. If all this is right and you have now done
away with PSAs and SDAs
(Sir Richard Mottram) No, we have not done away with
PSAs. We are going to have PSAs and SDAs.
438. Surely there is an obvious criticism here
which is to say you are going to set the targets for the reasons
that you have given, primarily for PR reasons to say, "Have
we not done well? We have achieved these targets",
(Sir Richard Mottram) We do not set them.
439. But one of the most difficult things is
urban renaissance and you say, "Oh, well, no, it is far too
complicated to work out how we can judge that so we will not have
one there" because the likelihood of achieving urban renaissance,
according to Lord Rogersand I challenge you: why do you
not get Lord Rogers to set a PSA? He will think up some useful
things and I bet you anything that if he did you would fail, if
you see what I mean. He would set demanding targets. Sorry; I
did not mean that rudely. What I meant was, if you ask him to
do it he would set demanding targets.
(Sir Richard Mottram) No, no. I did not take it rudely.
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