APPENDIX: THE GOVERNMENT'S RESPONSE TO
THE COMMITTEE'S REPORT "DEPARTMENT FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT:
2000 DEPARTMENTAL REPORT"
1. DFID's 2000 Departmental Report represents
a further significant improvement in DFID's accountability to
Parliament. It gives the reader an excellent overview of the policy
priorities of the Department, placed clearly in the context of
the year covered by the Report. In particular we welcome its analysis
of recent policy developments, current debates and important events,
and the increased level of detail about the Department's activities
over the past year and its plans for future years (paragraph 2).
3. We preface our discussion on DFID's bilateral
country programme expenditure plans with the comment that, both
in our scrutiny of DFID's expenditure in this inquiry and more
generally in our work during the course of the past year, we have
found the provision of figures for planned bilateral country programmes
at a country level in the Departmental Report to be an extremely
valuable resource. We congratulate DFID on its openness and transparency
in this regard (paragraph 11).
DFID notes the Committee's comments.
2. We welcome the reversal of the decline
in UK official development assistance which has taken place during
the past two years, and the Government's announcement in the recent
Spending Review of an increase in DFID's budget to £3.6 billion
in 2003/04, equivalent to 0.33 per cent of UK GNP (paragraph 9).
4. We welcome the flexibility of DFID's approach
to its bilateral country programmes, and its willingness publicly
to discuss changes in its plans for individual countries (paragraph
12).
5. We note that the planned increase in DFID's
bilateral country programme in China was not delivered in 1999/2000.
We shall monitor with interest, and in the light of the concerns
about human rights expressed in our Report on the 1999 Departmental
Report, DFID's future expenditure in China (paragraph 16).
DFID notes the Committee's comments but as we have
previously made clear our work in China enhances the human rights
of poor people.
6. We welcome the introduction of the new
Policy Performance Funds for Africa, Asia and the multilateral
development institutions. We look forward to information being
provided in future Departmental Reports on how and why the Funds
have been allocated between country programmes and institutions.
We would welcome further information from DFID on the intended
purpose of the International Policy Performance Fund (paragraph
19).
DFID will continue to explain major variations in
expenditure over plans.
The International Policy Performance Fund has been
created to enable DFID to make additional contributions at short
notice to reward multilateral organisations that are improving
the effectiveness and efficiency of their performance in contributing
towards the achievement of the International Development Targets
(IDTs). It is intended to enable DFID to target our resources
on those institutions that are likely to have most impact on the
IDTs. It will be used to reward improvements in performance and
to provide support to help multilateral organisations to press
ahead with reform processes that will help to improve the effectiveness
of their contribution to the IDTs.
7. We welcome, and look forward to receiving
further details of, the new cross-departmental budget for conflict
prevention and post-conflict reconstruction. We recommend that
DFID keep us informed of further details of this budget as they
become available, including details, for example, of the mechanisms
which will be put in place for administering the budget, the resources
allocated to the budget, and how the Departments concerned will
account for the expenditure to Parliament (paragraph 20).
In July HM Treasury announced that funds would be
allocated for two new cross departmental initiatives on Conflict
Prevention: (i) for Africa (to be managed by a Ministerial Committee
headed by the Secretary of State for International Development);
and (2) for Rest of the World headed by a Ministerial Committee
headed by the Foreign Secretary. It also indicated the level of
resources to be allocated to each:
SubSaharan Africa:
| Contributions from Departments (£m)
| 2001/2 | 2002/3
| 2003/4 |
| DFID | 23.5
| 23.5 | 23.5
|
| FCO | 5.0
| 5.0 | 5.0
|
| MoD | 1.5
| 1.5 | 1.5
|
| | |
|
| Additional Treasury Resources
| 20.0 | 20.0
| 20.0 |
| Total: (excluding peacekeeping)
| 50.0 | 50.0
| 50.0 |
| | |
|
| Indicative contributions from Treasury representing currently forecast peacekeeping/minor operations
| 65.0 | 60.0
| 60.0 |
| | |
|
| The Rest of The World:
| 2001/2 | 2002/3
| 2003/4 |
| Contributions from Departments MoD
| 32.0 | 32.0
| 32.0 |
| FCO | 7.0
| 7.0 | 7.0
|
| DFID 9.0 | 9.0
| 9.0 | |
| | |
|
| Additional Treasury resources
| 12.0 | 20.0
| 30.0 |
| Total (excluding peacekeeping/enforcement)
| 60.0 | 68.0
| 78.0 |
| | |
|
| Indicative contribution from Treasury representing forecast peacekeeping/enforcement /operations expenditure
| 340.0 | 380.0
| 380.0 |
The Cabinet Office has a key role in supporting these
processes. The new arrangements will come into effect from FY
2001 for a period of 3 years. However for Africa we will be operating
a 'virtual pool' arrangement for this year. This will ensure that
all the procedures and arrangements are in place for the Pool
to become fully operational at the beginning of the next financial
year.
Since July, officials from the concerned Departments
have begun to work out the accounting arrangements and procedures
for the operation of the Pools. Discussions are currently underway
on this and on the prioritisation of issues. A shared Target was
included in the Public Service Agreements of the three Departments,
which will be translated to more precise indicators in the forthcoming
Service Delivery Agreements.
8. DFID's performance targets, as contained
in the Public Service Agreement, fail to meet the Government's
own 'SMART' criteria (which specify that targets must be specific,
measurable, achievable, relevant and timed), and they fail to
cover the full range of DFID's policies and Departmental Objectives
(paragraph 35).
9. We do not question the value of the International
Development Targets, and we congratulate DFID on its work in mobilising
support for them among other donors and development partners.
Nor do we doubt that in various ways DFID's work is contributing
significantly to their achievement. It is our view, however, that
measuring DFID's performance as a Department by relating its expenditure
at country levels to specific development outcomes in a disparate
set of countries is so simplistic as to be uninformative and useless
(paragraph 36).
10. We welcome DFID's commitment to revise
its PSA, and we look forward to examining the revised targets
(paragraph 37).
11. We recommend that DFID revise its PSA
so as to differentiate between its overall objectives (to contribute
to the achievement of the IDTs) and the measurement of the effectiveness
of its own programmes and projects (and those of the multilateral
development organisations to which it contributes) against comprehensive,
clear, specific, measurable and timed targets. The targets should
be built on a strong basis of evaluation at project and programme
level, the results of which may then be aggregated to show DFID's
performance in each of its key policy areas (paragraph 38).
The targets contained in the 1999-2002 Public Service
Agreement (PSA) served as an important guide to the work of the
Department, in particular their focus on achieving the International
Development Targets. Progress against milestones were measured
for each target and set out in the 2000 Departmental Report. Milestones
were expressed in terms of annual targets, targets for a specific
date or based on assumed linear progression towards meeting the
International Development Targets by the due date (usually 2015).
The PSA targets were framed in sufficiently broad terms to capture
a large, yet still incomplete, picture of the work of the Department.
DFID reviewed the appropriateness of these PSA targets
as part of the 2000 Spending Review. A new PSA, which sets out
DFID's objectives for the period 2001-04, was published in July
(Cm 4808). It will shortly be supplemented by a published Service
Delivery Agreement and Technical Notes, which will say how DFID
intends to deliver its PSA objectives.
The new PSA is along the lines recommended by the
Committee. It has been constructed to enable clearer measurement
of progress towards the targets, that can be monitored and evaluated
regularly. Management systems are being put in place to allow
better evaluation of the effectiveness of bilateral programme
spend, as well as spend through multilateral institutions.
The new PSA objectives continue to be linked to the
International Development Targets but focus on what needs to be
achieved during the Spending Review period. It is not the purpose
of the new PSA to cover all DFID's activities; rather, it covers
the main planks of DFID's work and shows that DFID will direct
support where the impact on poverty will be greatest, in partnership
with developing country governments and other donors. Responsibility
for meeting some of the objectives is shared with other Government
Departments.
12. There is no doubt that there is a large
amount of policy analysis information now available, produced
by DFID and by others, perhaps most notably the World Bank. Whilst
this is welcome, it is not sufficient for DFID to learn from its
own successes and failures, and to be held properly to account
for its expenditure. A significant investment must also be made
in expenditure analysis and evaluation procedures. This is necessary
in order to establish the effectiveness of individual programmes
and projects in producing the desired outcomes (paragraph 39).
DFID has in place a robust system for management
of the project and programme cycle, including analysis and evaluation
of expenditure. The design of individual projects and programmes
includes financial analysis of planned expenditure and this is
reviewed throughout the project or programme cycle, on a proportionate
basis. Evaluation studies include systematic assessment of the
efficiency and effectiveness of interventions. Further initiatives
will be implemented to improve analysis and evaluation of expenditure,
including annual reviews of progress and expenditure against objectives
established in country and institutional strategy papers and for
centrally funded initiatives (e.g. Challenge Funds). Running costs
allocations will be based on assessment of performance against
targets set out in Departmental Policy and Resource Plans and
Service Level Agreements. A rolling programme of efficiency reviews,
agreed with Cabinet Office, will be implemented under the Government's
'Better Quality Services' initiative.
13. In its 1998 and 1999 Departmental Reports,
DFID included in each section a table showing information on its
expenditure captured by Policy Information Marker System data,
which measures expenditure according to key policy areas. In its
2000 Departmental Report, DFID has discontinued this practice.
We recommend that in future Departmental Reports, in each section
of its report relating to one of its policy objectives, DFID include
a table showing relevant Policy Information Marker System, Policy
Objective Markers and Poverty Aim Marker data for the past three
years. This will provide a clear and readily-accessible picture
of DFID's expenditure profile in relation to its objectives (paragraph
41).
The provisional analysis of 1999/2000 bilateral commitments
is attached.[1] This data
will also be included in the next edition of Statistics on International
Development. We will provide the relevant commitment data in respect
of our Policy Information, Policy Objective and Poverty Aim Markers
in the 2001 Departmental Report. We are not yet in a position
to provide full details of expenditure data, but are in the process
of remarking projects so that this information will be available
in future.
14. DFID's project completion report forms
have been revised recently to capture more information about lessons
learned from successes and failures, and we look forward to this
information being available on an annual basis in future project
completion report synthesis studies. This will represent a significant
improvement in their value as tools for learning lessons and applying
them in future projects and programmes. We recommend that, in
each section of future Departmental Reports, tables be included
showing the success of projects in each policy area in reaching
their objectives (as reported in the most recent project completion
report synthesis study), along with a summary of the key lessons
which have been learned (paragraph 43).
Our Project Completion Report Synthesis Study warned
that breaking down the data from project completion reports by
sector means that for a number of sectors, the sample size is
very small, and that consequently 'the findings could well be
misleading and unrepresentative in some respects' (EV 619 1998:
paragraph 23). By definition Project Completion Reports are also
historical. Introduction throughout DFID of the new project information
database (PRISM) will however improve our ability to report on
the success of projects. We will draw on all the available data
in future Departmental Reports.
15. The Project Completion Reports alone do
not present a comprehensive picture of DFID's performance. They
must be supported by evaluation studies which are independent,
published, are conducted after the completion of projects and
programmes, and which measure the broader and longer-term impact
of projects and programmes, and their contribution to poverty
eradication (paragraph 44).
16. We recommend that DFID revise its publications
catalogue to include evaluation studies, and that it update its
Internet site to include all evaluation studies on a regular basis.
This will enable other organisations outside DFID to benefit from
the studies more easily (paragraph 48).
DFID will regularly update its Internet site to include
newly published evaluation studies. The publications catalogue
does not refer to many of our specialist publications. It would
become too bulky if it did so.
17. We are sure that DFID's in-house Project
Completion Reports are compiled in good faith. Nevertheless we
would interpret cautiously an evaluation portfolio which consisted
almost entirely of self-assessment, without any supplementary
independent evaluations. At the very least, there is an undeniable
value in obtaining a second expert opinion on the strengths and
weaknesses of a project or programme and the nature and extent
of its impact, and on the lessons which may be drawn for future
work. We recommend that DFID significantly increase the proportion
of its projects and programmes that are subjected to evaluation
studies. We recommend that DFID publish an evaluation strategy
and invite suggestions from its staff and from the development
community on projects and programmes which might usefully be independently
reviewed. The strategy should include all aspects of its work,
including budgetary support and sector wide adjustment programmes
(SWAPs) (paragraph 50).
18. We look forward to the establishment of
the new Development and Impact Resource Centre, and request that
DFID keep us informed of progress in its work (paragraph 51).
All performance assessment systems, including those
in DFID, should strike a balance between performance assessment
for accountability and performance assessment for lesson learning.
Self-evaluation is a valuable tool for rapid lesson
learning and helps to ensure quick application of lessons learned
by those undertaking the evaluations. Sharing the lessons in a
timely and effective way within DFID, and with other governments
and development organisations, is an important part of the performance
assessment system, going beyond the formal evaluation process.
Independent evaluation plays a key role in terms of auditing the
quality and usefulness of (project-level) self-evaluations. We
expect such independent validation to continue to be an aspect
of our sectoral and thematic synthesis studies, and in the country
programme evaluations we plan to undertake. Country programme
evaluation will extend the proportion of DFID's portfolio subject
to systematic assessment.
DFID's Evaluation Department is currently reviewing
its future Programmes, and will be consulting internally and externally
about it. We will publish more information about our evaluation
strategies and findings in future Departmental Reports. The report
will also provide information of the work of the planned Resource
Centre (now titled the Performance Assessment Resource Centre
- PARC).
19. DFID publishes a large range of policy
analysis documents, strategy papers, and evaluation studies. It
has in place good evaluation systems, and has been working to
improve them. All this we welcome. There is a gap, however, between
these qualitative assessments of DFID's role and performance,
and the need to provide summary quantitative information about
the overall performance of the Department against clear and meaningful
targets. We recommend that DFID produce a set of revised departmental
targets, based on the results of its Project Completion Reports
and Evaluation Studies, disaggregated according to its objectives
and expenditure profile (paragraph 52).
The DFID Public Service Agreement and Service Delivery
Agreement provide a set of clear operational targets, disaggregated
by departmental objectives. Reporting against them will require
use of a wide range of performance information, including findings
from Project Completion Reports and Evaluation Studies.
20. BOND welcomed the new Civil Society Challenge
Fund in written evidence as a move which reflected "exciting
new strategic priorities for DFID's funding of civil society organisations
and [which] could offer significant benefits to the world's poor
people".[139] We agree. We welcome the establishment of the
Civil Society Challenge Fund as a special fund which has a remit
to strengthen civil society in developing countries. We consider
this an important element in DFID's overall programme (paragraph
56).
21. Given the priority themes for 2001/2002
funding under the Civil Society Challenge Fund, we recommend that
DFID substantially expand its traditional NGO list so as to include
more trade unions, labour organisations, local government organisations,
private sector interests, and southern-based NGOs (paragraph 57).
Ensuring the participation of a broad representation
of UK civil society groups in the Civil Society Challenge Fund
(CSCF) - as in other parts of DFID's work - is a priority. Progress
is being made, particularly with trade unions. Profit-making organisations
are excluded from the CSCF, but DFID involves the private sector
in its work, either through participation in other schemes (e.g.
the Enterprise Development Innovations Fund) and its country programmes
overseas. It is not feasible to provide funding directly from
the UK to Southern-based groups, because of issues of accountability,
but all CSCF projects must include Southern-based partners. Southern-based
groups, including NGOs, are supported from country and regional
programmes where appropriate, at an aggregate level which considerably
exceeds that available in the CSCF.
22. We invite DFID, in the light of the allocation
of funds in the 2000 Spending Review, to comment on future levels
of funding for the Civil Society Challenge Fund, taking into account
the increased competition for funds resulting from the amalgamation
of three channels of funding into one and of DFID's attempts to
attract new partners. We further recommend that DFID, as suggested
by BOND, maintain records of sound projects which are not awarded
funds as a result of lack of available resources, in order that
a possible case for increasing the volume of resources available
through the Civil Society Challenge Fund may be properly assessed
(paragraph 58).
Funding for the CSCF is reviewed annually, as part
of DFID's spending round. DFID recognises that the level may need
to increase if participation in the Fund is as strong as intended.
Funding is not at present a limiting factor for good projects.
23. We consider the assertion that "the
world has changed" and it is no longer difficult for specialist
NGOs to raise funds for sexual and reproductive health projects
to be a naive and incorrect one. It is our view that there continues
to be a strong case for the provision of 100 per cent funding
for innovative or catalytic projects in this field. It may well
be the case that the new Civil Society Challenge Fund is not an
appropriate instrument for such funding, and we are reassured
by the fact that there are other channels through which it may
be obtained. We request that in its response to this Report, DFID
provide details of the level of funding available through these
additional channels, what is the process for applying for funds,
and by what criteria they are allocated. Overall, we would not
wish at this stage to see a net reduction in the levels of resources
available for non-governmental sexual and reproductive health
projects (paragraph 61).
The promotion of better reproductive health care
continues to be a key objective for DFID. In financial terms our
commitment has more than doubled since the 1994 Cairo Conference
on Population and Development - from £32m in 1993, to over
£80m in 1999.
In the last two years, DFID has provided funding
of over £46 million from its bilateral country programmes
to NGO sexual and reproductive health projects - both UK-based
and indigenous NGOs. Most of these projects are fully funded as
part of the country programme's wider health strategy, with the
remainder co-funded, usually with other donors. The NGOs were
either selected in competition with others, or because DFID was
responding to specific proposals put forward by NGOs themselves.
DFID - Tanzania is developing a £2.4 million
funding scheme for civil society groups, which will be open to
organisations interested in advocacy work on sexual and reproductive
health issues. Zimbabwe, China and Russia will soon benefit from
new sexual and reproductive health initiatives, collectively worth
£35.5 million, which will involve NGO participation.
24. We recommend that DFID conduct and publish
an early analysis of the difficulties in raising funds for sexual
and reproductive health projects compared to projects relating
to other policy areas, and that, on the basis of that analysis,
DFID review its funding mechanisms for NGOs running such projects.
More generally, it would be wrong for the funding mechanism to
have as a result that support is skewed to causes which find it
easier to raise funds from the public. We look forward to learning
from DFID how it intends to prevent such distortions and ensure
that its development objectives are met (paragraph 62).
DFID has just completed the first CSCF decision round,
so it is too early, and the sample too small, to draw clear conclusions.
Sexual and reproductive health organisations will continue to
get preferential access to the fund until 2002/03, when 50% funding
will take effect.
Overall, DFID expenditure on sexual and reproductive
health is continuing to grow in recognition of its position as
a key international development target. Developing countries are
benefiting through DFID's strategic approach which builds on national
programmes and initiatives where all partners — including
NGOs and the private sector — can play important roles.
25. We recommend that DFID provide details
of other funding channels which may be used by NGOs which have
received funding under the CSCF for a project, and wish to apply
for further funds to continue the project (paragraph 63).
DFID (Civil Society Department) regularly informs
groups about non-DFID funding channels, such as the National Lottery
Charities Board, Comic Relief and the European Union (Co-financing
Scheme).
We will share information about successful CSCF projects
with other parts of DFID and will encourage these organisations
to approach in-country donors, including DFID, as CSCF projects
come to an end. If CSCF projects are successful in terms of scaling
up, they should be promoting the lessons learnt with governments
and donors in-country as early as possible.
26. We welcome DFID's review of its contracting
procedures, and we trust that our comments will assist DFID in
identifying areas which could usefully be examined as part of
the review (paragraph 66).
27. We accept DFID's argument that there are
some short-term or highly specialised contracts where open advertising
would not be cost-effective or productive, since there are only
a small number of consultants with the relevant skills or the
timescale makes it impossible. It is unfortunate, however, that
some contracts are let non-competitively simply because of their
comparatively low value. We recommend that DFID increase the proportion
of its smaller contracts which are let competitively. We suggest
that DFID consider ways of disseminating information about contracts,
and inviting expressions of interest from consultants, in cost-effective
ways, such as via its Internet page, and through open days for
consultants, regular bulletins, and networking organisations such
as the British Consultants' Bureau. More generally, we recommend
that DFID significantly increase the amount of information on
forthcoming competitions for contracts on its website, and that
the website be updated on a more regular basis. Outdated information
is of little use (paragraph 75).
DFID seeks to achieve Value for Money by awarding
contracts through competition. It is often the case that competition
is not deemed to represent value for money in small value contracts
because the additional cost of running a competition would outweigh
the benefits. This approach is consistent with Government procurement
policy.
We are already looking at ways of improving the spread
of information about DFID contracts e.g. we will place copies
of advertisements for DFID contracts on the Internet.
28. The comments made by British Consultants'
Bureau and International Family Health in written evidence lead
us to question the adequacy of the mechanisms DFID currently has
in place to ensure fair and effective decisions are made on the
selection of contractors. We recommend that in its review of procurement,
DFID include consideration of how its selection procedures might
be improved so as to remove the perception that its rules are
not always applied fairly, consistently or transparently (paragraph
79).
We believe we have come a long way in ensuring our
procurement systems and procedures are open and transparent and
will take account of the Committee's comments in developing further
improvements. We intend to publish on the Internet what bidders
can expect of DFID.
29. It appears that DFID does allow contractors
involved in the design of a project to bid for future contracts
for the implementation of the same project. We recommend that
in its response to this Report DFID confirm that this is the case,
and provide details of what mechanisms are in place to prevent
consultants from designing projects which only they can implement
(paragraph 81).
In some cases it has been appropriate for those involved
in the project design to be allowed to bid for the implementation
phase. DFID is very careful at all stages in the process to ensure
that projects are designed objectively to allow fair and open
competition.
30. We recommend that DFID review the information
it provides to consultants bidding for contracts so as to ensure
that they are furnished with all the necessary information about
the project (paragraph 82).
We accept the need to provide bidders with clear,
timely and complete information.
31. We are puzzled as to why DFID took the
decision to embark on a resource centre agreement with John Snow
International, despite its failure to meet all the criteria for
inclusion on DFID's Consultants' Index. We recommend that DFID
provide us with a full account of the circumstances under which
approval may be given for consultants to be hired who do not meet
the eligibility criteria (paragraph 89).
The circumstances are explained in our previous memorandum
(page 94 of the Committee's Report). John Snow International met
all the relevant criteria for the contract it was awarded, and
was not singled out for special treatment.
32. We welcome the work DFID has done to seek
a multilateral agreement on aid untying. We also welcome the recent
communiqué from the leaders of the G8 countries, which
contained a commitment to an agreement to untie aid to the least
developed countries, and look forward to further progress being
made in negotiations at the OECD (paragraph 96).
We note the Committee's comments and share their
hopes for further progress.
33. We welcome the steps taken so far to decentralise
DFID's procurement capacity, and we consider this to be an essential
step towards increasing its use of local consultants, with the
potential result of achieving a much greater and more sustainable
development impact (paragraph 97).
34. We welcome the work that has taken place
to increase the proportion of contracts which are let locally
in those countries where DFID has been piloting new initiatives
and building its procurement capacity. We also welcome the overall
increase from two to six per cent of contracts which are let to
local consultants (paragraph 99).
We note the Committee's comments.
35. We recommend that DFID give consideration
to ActionAid's proposal for larger contracts which would normally
be let to UK-based consultants to be broken down into smaller
contracts and let locally instead (paragraph 102).
Where DFID can obtain better value for money —
for example more appropriate services — by breaking activities
down into smaller contracts, we shall do this.
36. We invite DFID to comment upon the potential
use of targeted procurement in developing countries (paragraph
103).
There is evidence (for example from Canadian studies)
that targeted procurement is not always effective in achieving
its aim and can detract from value for money. DFID is confident
that local suppliers are in most cases capable of winning business
on their own merits.
37. Technical co-operation represents a large
portion (43 per cent in 1998 of DFID's bilateral oda. This portion
of the programme must be fully incorporated into DFID's evaluation
strategy (paragraph 104).
As the Departmental
Report (Figure 5, page 154) explains, Technical Cooperation is
a general description which includes a variety of different forms
of aid. They are examined, where appropriate, in DFID's project
and programme evaluation studies.
38. We recommend that, in addition to individual
project appraisals, DFID periodically review the performance of
each of its resource centres (paragraph 105).
We will regularly review the performance of consultants
including resource centres.
39. We welcome DFID's pilot of outputs-based
contracts, and we look forward to examining the results, and any
proposals for changes in consultancy contracting procedures, in
due course (paragraph 106).
We will keep the Committee informed.
40. We are not satisfied by the responses
we received from DFID when we put to its officials our perception
that there was a widespread fear among contractors of complaining
about any aspect of its work. We are reassured to some extent
by DFID's admission that it perhaps needed to work to obtain better
feedback from its contractors, but we are alarmed rather than
comforted by the implausibly low number of complaints dealt with
by the complaints officer (paragraph 111).
We agree that full informal dialogue between DFID
and its contractors is vital for good procurement. Meetings are
currently being organised to obtain more feedback from consultants.
41. We recommend that in reviewing its procurement
procedures, DFID actively seek out constructive comments from
consultants about the matters we have discussed in this Report,
paying particular attention to their views on how complaints procedures
might be amended to dispel the fear of complaining which currently
prevails and to encourage constructive criticisms which might
improve the Department's work (paragraph 112).
We will include discussion of the complaints procedures
in the meetings mentioned above.
42. We recommend that DFID include in its
contracting procedures a check to establish whether potential
contractors appear on the World Bank's list of companies debarred
from funds as a result of corruption. Such companies should not
be awarded contracts by DFID. We recommend that DFID review the
potential for co-operation with other donors on this matter, and
inform us of the outcome of its deliberations as soon as they
are available (paragraph 114).
We are considering how to make more effective co-operation
with other donors as part of the international fight against corruption.
More detail is provided in the memorandum on fighting
corruption submitted to the Committee in response to its current
enquiry.
43. We invite DFID to comment upon the possibility
of adapting the DETR and HM Treasury guidelines on ethical purchasing
to its consultancy procurement procedures (paragraph 116).
We work continuously to ensure DFID procedures are
in line with OGC guidelines provided to all Departments by the
Office of Government Commerce (OGC).
44. We accept that DFID should use consultants
to implement some of its programmes. During this inquiry, however,
we have found that DFID's procedures require improvement. In particular,
there are concerns about the selection of contractors, the ability
and willingness of contractors to make complaints to DFID in confidence,
and appropriate safeguards against corruption. We look forward
to the outcome of the current review, and trust that it will heed
our recommendations (paragraph 117).
We note the Committees comments and will bear them
in mind as we work to improve DFID's procurement processes.
Department for International Development
October 2000
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