The Home Office has an ‘inadequate focus’ on saving taxpayers’ money, its top civil servant has admitted.
The department’s permanent secretary Dame Antonia Romeo also confirmed she had identified areas of ‘siloed working’ and a ‘lack of accountability’ since she took over in April.
Dame Antonia’s admissions came in a letter to the Commons’ home affairs select committee which last week published a damning report which found the Home Office had ‘squandered’ billions of pounds on asylum hotels.
Cross-party MPs blasted the department’s ‘incompetence’ over its handling of a ‘failed, chaotic and expensive’ system.
There was ‘manifest failure’ by the Home Office to ‘get a grip’ of contracts with private companies it appointed to house asylum seekers, they concluded.
As a result, the firms had been allowed make ‘excessive profits’ from the Channel crisis.
Dame Antonia is appearing before the committee this afternoon.
In her letter, released in advance of the evidence session, she said: ‘Many improvements have been made in recent years.
Dame Antonia Romeo, the Home Office permanent secretary, admitted there was a ‘lack of accountability’ in the department and a lack of focus on saving taxpayers’ money
‘However, there are several areas where we urgently need to go further.
‘There are instances of siloed working and can be a lack of accountability for ministers’ highest priorities.
‘Having drawn from the Treasury’s Reserve for several years now, the department’s financial discipline has been weakened and there is a lack of a commercial mindset with inadequate focus on value for money.
‘The department’s need to respond to crises has also eroded the ability to focus on longer term strategic thinking.’
She outlined a number of reforms she was making within the Home Office.
Last week’s report, one of the most critical ever published into the dysfunctional department, said the Home Office was ‘not up to this challenge’ and demanded a series of major changes.