§ Mr. MilburnTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department what monitoring takes place by his Department of the use of external consultants by non-departmental public bodies. [16756]
§ Mr. HowardThe use of external consultants by non-departmental public bodies is not routinely monitored, since this would be incompatible with the delegated responsibility given to the governing bodies, but their use of consultants will often have been taken into account in the scrutiny of their annual budgets and business plans.