Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 4 December 2024 to Question 14108 on Arm’s Length Bodies, on what statutory basis Permanent Secretaries rather than Ministers approve framework agreements.

Permanent Secretaries are appointed as Accounting Officers for their departments by the Treasury under section 5 of the Government Resources and Accounts Act 2000. They are directly responsible to Parliament for ensuring that their department's use of public resources are regular and in line with parliamentary expectations. This includes compliance with the wider framework of authorities, which include the various rules and guidance set out in Managing Public Money.

As part of these requirements, Accounting Officers are required to have appropriate structures and systems in place to ensure effective governance of the public bodies that they sponsor. These include the Accounting Officer System Statement, and the need for a framework document for each public body sponsored. As such, in general, the requirement for a framework document is not statutory, but does form part of the Accounting Officer’s duties, meaning that the Accounting Officer is responsible for ensuring that a framework document is in place.

Framework documents, while not legal documents, set out the terms of the relationship between the arms-length body and the sponsor, including the sponsorship processes by which public bodies align with and deliver on public policy objectives set by Ministers and, in some cases, legislation. They codify a combination of policy decisions made by ministers, parliamentary expectations and general principles of good governance. The processes for approval are not set out in statute, and can vary from department to department, and from arms-length body to arms-length body.