Government Urged To Improve Welfare Reform Strategy

Sweeping reforms to the benefit system have been hindered by failures to anticipate problems and over-reliance on assumptions, the government’s spending watchdog has said. The National Audit Office (NAO) said in a report today that the DWP should learn lessons from mistakes it has made implementing reforms to welfare, such as the long-overdue introduction of universal credit. Criticising the DWP’s strategy, the NAO said the department did not ‘have sufficient understanding of its portfolio of programmes or overall capacity’ and begun several large reforms without understanding its ability to manage the programmes. The NAO warned that the department relied on ‘uncertain and insufficiently challenged assumptions’ which had contributed to civil servants failing to anticipate risks. Download a copy of the report - Welfare reform – lessons learned – from the NAO website.