HC Deb 22 March 1996 vol 274 c378W
Mr. Redmond

To ask the Secretary of State for Health what plans he has to improve the standard of health service financial management. [21726]

Mr. Horam

A number of initiatives have been undertaken to make further improvements in this area. They include:

  1. (a) Corporate governance: Codes of conduct and accountability have been adopted by the boards of NHS authorities and trusts. In addition NHS organisations have established Audit, and remuneration and terms of service committees, and chief executives in the NHS have been formally designated as accountable officers.
  2. (b) Internal audit: The internal audit development group, established to steer the development of the internal audit function is currently sponsoring a national controls assurance project. The project aims to develop a comprehensive risk and control framework for NHS organisations.
  3. (c) Financial training: A financial management programme was launched in 1992 aimed at improving the overall standard of financial management in the NHS. The programme is continually updated to take account of changes to the NHS and two further publications are due shortly.
  4. (d) Financial monitoring: The NHS executive continues to develop comprehensive financial monitoring systems to enable the financial management of the NHS to be closely monitored.