Appendix
GOVERNMENT RESPONSE
Thank you for copying to me your report entitled
"The Committee's Work in 2004", which was published
on 27th January. I continue to be very appreciative of the Committee's
work and can personally endorse the Report's overall conclusion
that both the main Committee and the newly formed sub-Committee
perform an extremely valuable role.
I would like to respond to three substantive points
in your Report.
First, on the issue of parades the Report states
(at paragraphs 17-20) that "the failure of the Government
to engage in a timely fashion with so important an issue has given
the impression of a lack of leadership and has been disappointing".
I do not believe that this criticism is supported by the facts.
As the Committee is aware the Government responded to the
Quigley Report in a written ministerial statement on the 22 February
2005. This set out a package of measures aiming at improving rather
than fundamentally changing the existing parading arrangements.
The delay between the publication of the report and the formal
response of the Government was a result of a wish fully
to take account of the views of all stakeholders. In particular the
original consultation period was extended to enable
key stakeholders to submit a response. With the launch
of the Committee's inquiry into the Parades issue it
was deemed appropriate to examine its conclusions and
recommendations before making any firm policy decisions.
The subsequent report has been of much value in
preparing the Government response, which was issued within
six weeks of its publication.
The second issue I would wish to comment on is the
Report's assessment of the Departmental Annual Report format (see
paragraph 34 of Report). I am particularly grateful for the helpful
comments in this area and I note in particular the Committee's
recognition that the proof-reading has improved.
We have made substantial changes to the 2004 Departmental
Report which have been carried through and improved upon for the
2005 Departmental Report. An important element has been to provide
consistency in the structure of reporting, therefore each core
function within the Department reports on performance using a
standard series of headings, such as 'Looking back over 2004;
Highlights of the Year; Looking forward etc'.
These presentational changes may go some way to explain
the perception of a reduction in reporting on some areas of the
Department's activities such as the Compensation Agency. For
example the Compensation Agency entry in the 2004 Departmental
Report contains 30% more script than the 2003 report.
The Committee also commented on the lack of information
on some of the Department's associated bodies. Many of these
bodies were created to provide public assurance of their independence,
and we therefore judge that it could be counterproductive to include
detailed reports on their performance in the NIO's Departmental
Report. Where appropriate a reference to the body and its own
annual report is included.
Finally, the Report (see paragraph 35) comments on
the NIO's performance in meeting its target for handling Ministerial
correspondence. It is clear that the Department needs to go on
making sustained efforts in this area. As the report notes, there
has been an improvement in performance (and figures for 2004 suggest
that the gains made have been maintained); and this is against
the background of a target for correspondence tighter than that
of many Departments. The factors we have previously drawn attention
to - such as the need to seek information from outside organisations
in dealing with many cases - continue to hold true. There is also
a rising volume of work to be dealt with in parallel, created
for example by increased number of parliamentary questions and
(more recently) Freedom of Information requests.
Nevertheless we acknowledge that more needs to be
done to improve our record here further. Setting a target involving
a few more days to reply to correspondence, in line with some
other Departments, is of course one possibility, as the Committee's
report hints, and would be more satisfactory in a proportion of
cases where, because of the need to coordinate responses from
a number of sources, the 10 day target is not a practical proposition.
But we should be unwilling to abandon the present more demanding
target unless convinced it would lead to an improvement in our
service to Parliament overall. We shall investigate this further.
I trust that you and the Committee find this response
helpful.
| 
