§ The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence (Mr. Adam Ingram)The business review of the defence vetting process has been completed. The review team has made a number of recommendations and observations, which Director General (security and safety) has agreed and endorsed, and as the senior responsible officer will oversee the implementation strategy.
The key findings of the review are that the rationalisation of the former defence vetting organisations has been successful, providing both economies and efficiencies in the vetting process and offering opportunities for further performance enhancement and business expansion. The Defence Vetting Agency (DVA) has achieved the prime aim required by its framework document and become an integrated and cohesive organisation. Standardised procedures for defence vetting have been adopted by the agency, which has successfully consolidated the majority of the disparate processes previously used within the separate service vetting organisations. The organisation is correctly sized to deliver its required output and over the period 1997–98 to 2002–03 has reduced its net operating costs from £11 million to £9.6 million, with the staff component reducing by £1.8 million.
The review also concluded that the DVA should remain a defence agency and, as the largest UK vetting organisation, is well placed to extend its services to a wider range of other Government Departments, if required.
I have arranged for copies of the report of the business review to be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.
Key targets have now been set for the chief executive of the DVA for the financial year 2004–05. Building upon the progress made since it formed in 1997, these incremental targets will help the agency to become much 39WS more responsive to its customers, and be well placed to move towards carrying out security clearances more quickly, without any loss of quality.
Quality
KEY TARGET 1:
Through external validation, achieve at least a 95 per cent. success rating with specially selected cases, and achieve zero serious errors that should have been identified at the time of vetting.KEY TARGET 2:
To complete 33 per cent. of the three-year security check and developed vetting backlog review programme.Timeliness
KEY TARGET 3:
To improve the completion time of routine cases to:
- (a) 62 per cent. of counter terrorist checks completed within 30 calendar days.
- (b) 65 per cent. of security checks completed within 30 calendar days.
- (c) 50 per cent. of developed vetting completed within 100 calendar days.
KEY TARGET 4:
40WSTo improve the completion time of priority cases to:
- (a) 45 per cent. of priority counter terrorist and security check cases completed within 10 calendar days.
- (b) 90 per cent. of priority developed vetting completed within 30 calendar days.
KEY TARGET 5:
To achieve average completion times of:
- (a) 30 calendar days for counter terrorist checks.
- (b) 30 calendar days for security checks.
- (c) 100 calendar days for developed vetting.
Efficiency
KEY TARGET 6:
To reduce the unit cost of output by 2 per cent.I have arranged tor advance copies of the DVA corporate plan to be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.