This report focuses on the Department's management of a programme of PFI projects in order to fulfil a specific objective: delivering sufficient infrastructure to ensure that EU Landfill Directive obligations are met.
The scope included all projects that had received or applied for PFI Credits, and which had begun procurement prior to March 2008. As the focus was on Defra's use and management of resources we did not examine projects which have not received or applied for any central Government financial support. A full examination of the value for money of the individual projects was outside the scope of the audit. However, we did review the Department's data on projects, and reviewed documentation held by the Department for a sample of procurements, in order to assess whether the Department's processes were sufficiently robust to ensure that the projects being entered into by local authorities were likely to offer value for money.