§ Mr. ToddTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will list each of the functions relating to payment for goods or services supplied for which his Department is responsible, indicating the management systems purchased, all subcontractors involved in the work, co-operative arrangements with other Departments; and the costs of the systems and processes the last year for which figures are available. [12567]
§ Mr. MorleyMAFF has developed procurement procedures based upon guidance issued by the Central Unit on Purchasing in HM Treasury. These procedures are designed to ensure probity and fairness in all procurement decisions and provide the necessary checks and authorisations in accordance with Government Accounting and separate the functions of verification and authorisation from the process of payment.
MAFF has implemented a fully integrated computerised accounting system (RAMIS—Resource Accounting and Management Information System) running on proprietary software and hardware. Implementation of the system has been supported fully by the primary software and hardware suppliers supplemented with specialised external service providers as necessary. These have been provided for under contract. Generally the Ministry does not use subcontractors for payment work; the exception is the use of managing agents to pay small contractors for minor building maintenance work to ensure that they are paid quickly. Payments for goods and services are made using RAMIS either by bank transfer (CHAPS and BACS) or as system-generated payable orders. Significant work has been undertaken by Ministry staff to ensure that the system has been developed to meet initial and changing requirements.
As part of a suite of functions within RAMIS the Accounts Payable application is one element of a much wider financial management system and specific capital 820W and development costs are therefore not readily available. However, information collected from within the management system suggests that the administrative costs of making payments via the system (for Headquarters Groups) is approximately £4 per payment based upon inner London staff costs.
MAFF is an active member of the Oracle Applications User Group in which other Government Departments may be involved.