The Government announced in its July 2007 Green Paper “The Governance of Britain” (Cm 7170) that it would simplify its financial reporting to Parliament, ensuring that it reports in a more consistent fashion at all three stages in the process—on plans, estimates and expenditure outcomes.

The Treasury submitted an initial memorandum to the relevant parliamentary Committees in November 2008, outlining the Government’s emerging thinking on how this commitment might best be delivered. I have sent a further memorandum to the Committees this week setting out the Government’s formal proposals for achieving better alignment between budgets, estimates and accounts. The proposals take account of the views expressed by the Committees in response to the November memorandum, as well as the results of a consultation exercise with key stakeholders external to Government, carried out during autumn 2008.

The memorandum notes that the Government propose to begin implementation of the new, better aligned framework from April 2010. To achieve this deadline, the Government would welcome Parliament’s agreement to its proposals by July 2009.

The memorandum is being published as a Command paper and presented to the House, and copies have today been placed in the House of Commons Vote Office, to enable all Members to assess the Government’s proposals.