§ Mr. BeggsTo ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland what measures have been introduced in each Northern Ireland department to reduce budget under spend. [128295]
§ Mr. PearsonNorthern Ireland departments have introduced a number of measures to reduce the level of budget under spend. These include enhanced information and monitoring systems, improved arrangements to monitor the progress of expenditure on capital investment projects, providing additional training for budget managers and reviewing, on an ongoing basis, profiled expenditure against actual expenditure.
At a more strategic level, the revised spending plans for 2003–04 to 2005–06, which I announced on 11 December 2002, included arrangements to set spending plans at a level which exceeded the total spending power available by building in under spend assumptions. Full details are set out in Section 2 of the Budget Document ("Building on Progress: Budget 2003–06").