The Cabinet Office reported that it has made progress towards fully implementing converged HR processes and standards in 2026.71 The Cabinet Office pointed towards a new £5 million standardisation project it has undertaken to facilitate HR convergence.72 The Cabinet Office also recognised that convergence was an iterative process given changes to HR policy.73 However, the Cabinet Office could not indicate an exact timeline by which the Government People Function will implement the converged processes and standards required for clusters to onboard departments to shared services.74 In subsequent correspondence, the Cabinet Office stated that it expects these data and processes to align before departments can join their assigned shared services cluster.75 What however is the timetable for this? 67 Committee of Public Accounts, Use of AI in government, Eighteenth Report of Session 2024–25, HC 356, 26 March 2025, para 1 ; C&AG’s report, Improving government’s productivity through better cost information, Session 2024–26, HC 1291, 15 September 2025, para 6 68 Q 55 69 C&AG’s Report, para 2.17 70 Qq 55, 56 71 Q 61 72 Qq 60, 61 73 Qq 56, 59, 66 74 Q 68 75 Letter from the Cabinet Office to PAC dated 3 June 2026, p.4 18