Public Bodies Bill [Lords]

My hon. Friend will forgive me, but I really do need to make progress. A great many Members wish to contribute to the debate. Our first test of a body was the existential test—does its function need to be carried out at all? If, as in most cases, the body's functions were deemed necessary, we then sought to establish whether the functions should be carried out independently. We had three tests. If a body carries out a highly technical activity, if it is required to be politically impartial or if it needs to be able to act independently to establish or measure facts, it is right for it to remain outside direct ministerial or other democratic accountability. That is clearly the case with bodies such as the new Office for Budget Responsibility, Ofgem and many others. Any body that does not meet any of those tests will either be brought back into a Department, where it can be held accountable to the House through a Minister, or devolved to local authorities. In both cases there will be democratic accountability. Or in some cases, a body's functions could be carried out outside the state altogether in the private or voluntary sectors. We went through an extensive process to determine the outcome of the review. The first task was simply to establish how many quangos there were and what they did. It may sound absurd, but it was and remains incredibly difficult to get firm information on that. Many do not publish accounts, there is no central list and there are many different types of quango with different statuses. The official list of non-departmental public bodies contains 679 bodies, excluding those in Northern Ireland, but that does not include non-ministerial departments, Government-owned public corporations or trading funds. Our review covered 901 bodies, and we believe, but cannot be certain, that that is the true extent of the landscape. I stress that departmental Executive agencies were not within the review's scope. They are directly controlled by Ministers, who are accountable to Parliament for what they do. At the end of that review, I announced our proposals to the House on 14 October last year. They were that 481 of the bodies should be substantially reformed, including 192 abolished entirely and a further 118 merged. Since that announcement we have concluded consideration of a number of other bodies, and I can tell the House that the current total is that 495 bodies will be reformed, including 200 abolished and 120 others merged into 59 successor bodies. We have moved quickly to implement that programme, and I am pleased to tell the House that 45 bodies had been abolished by the end of April this year. Overall, we expect to make administrative savings—I stress that they are administrative—of £2.6 billion from public bodies over the spending review period. That money will be better spent on protecting public sector jobs and on front-line services.