The National Audit Office's role

4  We have examined major programmes across different parts of government and at different stages over many years, including a significant number of transport, defence and energy programmes. Our work has directly supported Parliamentary scrutiny of government programmes and provides an independent evidence base to inform the public about how government programmes are performing.

5  We have previously brought together what we have learned in different ways and for different audiences. For example, we have produced:

•  outputs on over-optimism, assurance, lessons from major rail infrastructure programmes;

•  a briefing for the Committee of Public Accounts on the government's attempts to improve programme management;

•  a framework to review major programmes, currently being updated;

•  a tool to understand the challenges in delivering programme objectives;

•  a guide to initiating successful projects; and

•  a survival guide for senior decision-makers on how to challenge project costs.

6  This report draws together insights from our recent reports on major programmes, including on Crossrail, Carrier Strike and Universal Credit. While there is a wealth of literature and courses on major programmes, we repeatedly see similar problems. We think that many of these problems have their roots in four key areas: scope, planning, managing interdependencies and oversight.

7  This report examines the root causes of the issues we see most often and why we think they occur, in order to identify learning points that we think government should focus on in order to improve its performance on major programmes. It is not an exhaustive account of the difficulties that programmes face. In some places we include specific examples from our published work. These are illustrative examples and are not indicative of the overall performance of a specific department. Nor do all of the programmes featured, or in government, suffer all of the issues we identify. The report focuses mainly on infrastructure rather than purely transformation or digital programmes, but these lessons are also applicable to all types of projects and programmes.

8  Figure 1 on pages 6 and 7 summarises our key learning points.