When undertaking the development of the business case, agencies should be mindful that the level of information and analysis required must be sufficient to enable the Cabinet Budget Review Committee and Cabinet to:
• determine the preferred project delivery option
• make commitments regarding funding of the potential project.
This does not mean that every identified technical solution and project delivery option needs to be analysed to the same degree. The level of analysis required to establish which project delivery option is likely to deliver better 'value for money' is extensive. It should be possible to discount options early on in the process without fully developing public sector comparator s and partnership models to prove the case.
It is therefore suggested that as part of the preliminary assessment (stage 2), the number of shortlisted technical solutions are kept to a minimum. The number of technical solutions taken forward into the business case (stage 3) will of course be determined on a project-by-project basis, but it is recommended that a maximum of two or three should be considered further, except in very large and/or complex projects. In most cases it should be possible to review the preliminary assessment (stage 2) and simply focus on the single most desirable or practical technical solution.
Similarly, the number of project delivery options will be determined on a project-by-project basis but it is recommended that, except in very large and/or complex projects, a maximum of two or three partnership models should be sufficient. It should be possible to develop the public private partnership project by discounting those project delivery options that are unlikely to meet with government's objectives or fail the public interest test. This will reduce the unnecessary time and expense spent in developing partnership models for each option. By qualitatively assessing the value drivers, it should be possible to focus in on a single public private partnership Delivery Option as the most likely to deliver value for money on a quantitative basis.