57th Report - Government services: Generating income

Select Committee
Public Accounts Committee HC 890 10 December 2025
Report Status Government responded
Conclusions & Recommendations 25 items (16 recs)
Source View on Parliament website
Government Response (AI assessment · 25 of 25 classified)
Accepted 9
Accepted in Part 5
Acknowledged 5
Not Addressed 1
Rejected 5
Government response
Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Fifty-seventh report from Session 2024-26 · published 1 Apr 2026
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Recommendations & Conclusions

5 results
10 Conclusion Acknowledged
Government services consistently fail to meet cost-recovery targets, leading to persistent financial imbalances.
Conclusion
Over the five-year period from 2019-20 to 2023-24, none of the seven government services reviewed consistently met their cost-recovery targets. Poor cost-recovery persisting over time results in a build-up of surplus and deficits in some services. Both passports and family … Read more
Government Response Summary
The Treasury acknowledged the challenge of potential inequities for users when government bodies under or overcharge for services and hopes to address this through stronger incentives for departments to encourage lower costs through efficiencies.
HM Treasury
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11 Conclusion Acknowledged
Significant fee-cost imbalances risk public service financial resilience and create unfair taxpayer burden.
Conclusion
Significant imbalances between fees and costs pose risks to the financial resilience of public services and create unfairness for the public. The NAO reported that the passport service has been underrecovering since 2017-18 without explicit approval from Home Office Ministers … Read more
Government Response Summary
The Treasury acknowledged the challenge of potential inequities for users when government bodies under or overcharge for services and hopes to address this through stronger incentives for departments to encourage lower costs through efficiencies.
HM Treasury
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12 Conclusion Acknowledged
Persistent fee imbalances create inequities, forcing future users to overpay or current users to subsidise.
Conclusion
The NAO report highlighted that persistent imbalances can also create potential inequities for users. When government bodies undercharge for services, cumulative losses are often recouped through higher fees for future users. Conversely, when services over-recover, current users end up overpaying.22 … Read more
Government Response Summary
The Treasury acknowledged the challenge of potential inequities for users when government bodies under or overcharge for services and hopes to address this through stronger incentives for departments to encourage lower costs through efficiencies.
HM Treasury
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20 Conclusion Acknowledged
Charged services lack transparency in disclosing full cost details and over-recovery funding.
Conclusion
The NAO reported the charged services it examined did not fully fulfil their disclosure requirements on areas such as unit costs, the cost-recovery targets, objectives, the extent and explanation for over or under-recovery.39 The lack of transparency affects public confidence … Read more
Government Response Summary
The Treasury will update the Financial Reporting Manual (FReM) to align to 6.11 of Managing Public Money (MPM) by Spring 2026 to include clearer reporting guidance for fee-charging public bodies to ensure more effective Parliamentary scrutiny and will continue to keep this under review including considering as part of a wider review of Central Government financial reporting.
HM Treasury
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21 Conclusion Acknowledged
Treasury recognises the need for proportionate financial reporting and improved fee transparency.
Conclusion
The NAO report highlighted the importance of proportionate financial reporting requirements, particularly for smaller bodies.43 We asked how the Treasury will make sure its disclosure requirements are proportionate. The Treasury told us that it is mindful of the administrative burden, … Read more
Government Response Summary
The Treasury will update the Financial Reporting Manual (FReM) to align to 6.11 of Managing Public Money (MPM) by Spring 2026 to include clearer reporting guidance for fee-charging public bodies to ensure more effective Parliamentary scrutiny and will continue to keep this under review including considering as part of a wider review of Central Government financial reporting.
HM Treasury
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