When this Committee last reported in 2016 it noted that the quality of oversight by departments was inconsistent.20 There remains a lack of consistency in how ALBs work with departments and how they are held to account. In order to try and bring greater uniformity to how departments and ALBs work together, the Cabinet Office introduced its Code of Good Practice in 2017. However, the Cabinet Office does not monitor whether departments follow this code in practice and told the NAO that its current approach is not to monitor and understand how departments are overseeing their ALBs.21 In 2016, this Committee also noted that more benchmarking of ALB performance would improve efficiency by highlighting where there is scope for improvement.22 The Cabinet Office told us that although it publishes data on public bodies annually this does not include performance data. It admitted it had not done enough to provide good-quality benchmarking data since we last reported and acknowledged that this data would help drive stronger performance.23