3.2 The Department's Executive Committee and Board monitor progress in reducing costs. In addition to internal financial reporting, they receive reports tracking progress against specific spending review and business plan commitments. A central team judges progress on the basis of information from line teams, providing a degree of independence and consistency. Taken together, financial and progress reports give senior management information including:
• forecast spend against budgets, helping to give assurance on whether the Department is 'on track' to spend within its annual budget;
• an assessment of the level of challenge and risks to individual commitments; and
• progress on particular actions needed to reduce budgets.
In October 2011, the Department also forecast underspend and overspend on budget lines in future years, and intends to update this assessment periodically.
3.3 While progress on individual actions is clearly reported, information is limited in that:
• reports tracking progress against spending review commitments provide a qualitative assessment but do not quantify the impact on the Department's budgets (quantitative forecasts are prepared separately);
• it does not report on the impact on value. This is particularly important to track whether efficiencies are being made and sustained; and
• it is not linked to progress against the Department's high-level objectives, such as reducing carbon emissions.