Treasury papers miss target for technical quality
Treasury reports miss the mark on technical quality
Treasury reports miss the mark on technical quality
The Treasury will put its policy advice under the microscope to figure out if it has a "systemic" problem after missing its technical performance target in reports.
The government's financial adviser is investigating a series of weaker reports "to decide whether they are representative of more systemic issues," after only 68% of its papers surveyed had adequate technical quality, missing the Treasury's 70% target.
A panel appointed to review the Treasury's policy advice found those papers included in the appraisal were mainly well written and showed a deep understanding of the issues, but those with lower scores didn't discuss enough alternative options, lacked detail on how conclusions were reached, and failed to set advice within a broader context.
The Treasury met its target of satisfying the minister of finance, crossing the 70% target with a performance of 78.3%, and its total cost per hour of producing reports came in below target at $183.
The Treasury's annual report showed just 63% of regulatory impact statements met impact analysis requirements, short of the 90% target, and the third year in a row that goal has been missed."
An evaluation of regulatory impact statements by Sapere Research Group this year found just 15 of 50 documents met quality assurance standards, a further 25 partially met them, and 10 didn't meet them.
Similarly, the Treasury's annual report shows just 44% of significant new operating expenditure programmes during the Budget were subject to a cost benefit analysis, less than half the targeted 100%.
"While the Treasury analysed and provided advice to Budget Ministers on all significant operating initiatives, cost benefit analysis was not always completed by departments," the report says. "This was often owing to initiatives for new funding which were developed late, or outside of, the planned Budget process.
"The Treasury continues to look for opportunities to improve performance in this area including furthering work done and initiated during 2014/15 to develop cost benefit analysis tools."
The report says the department has been looking at ways it can lift efficiency, using "lean" techniques to save time and make work easier, and has developed a more intensive graduate development programme and introduced standardised tools to monitor financial performance across public spending as ways to enhance its performance.
(BusinessDesk)