LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s deputy finance minister Darren Jones said on Tuesday the government would conduct the first zero based review of spending in 17 years.
Financial support will only be made available to departments that have met requirements set out in the zero based government spending review, Jones said.
“Funding from the Treasury to support new priorities will only be made available to departments that have first fulfilled the requirements of our zero based review and met the minimum 5% savings and efficiency target required in this spending review process,” Jones said in a keynote speech at the Institute for Government’s annual conference.
“We will no longer just negotiate what top ups to existing budgets departments will get, but we will scrutinise and challenge every pound of existing budgets first,” he added.
(Reporting by Suban Abdulla; Editing by Catarina Demony)
