2017-10-05
The State is Still Unaware of Which and How Many Services should be Provided by Public Sector Institutions
Lithuania has over 4,000 public administrative bodies, maintained from the state and municipal budgets, which carry out state management functions and ensure the provision of public and administrative services. In considering the requirements which apply to the goals and quality of the service, the public sector should provide only those services, which cannot be provided by non-governmental and community organisations or business enterprises. According to the audit conducted by the National Audit Office, entitled, “On the Preparedness for Making Decisions Regarding the Reform of the Provision of Administrative and Public Services”, the number of such services and the bodies responsible for their provision are still unknown.
The auditors note that public institutions fail to provide information on the quality of the services they provide, which is the reason why the state lacks reliable data on the services provided by public administrative bodies, as well as their quality, availability, and price. During previous audits, the National Audit Office had repeatedly found the quality of the services provided by the public sector to be lacking.
Even though there is currently no established and well-calibrated model for general management, new service providers are still being set up. For instance, during the I quarter of 2015-2017, the municipality had set up 46 new service providers – establishments and companies.
Ministry of the Interior was tasked with conducting the monitoring and analysis of the provision of public services. The Ministry has been collecting related information since 2013 and was scheduled to finish by May of the present year.
“Regardless of the 862,000 Euros invested in the monitoring system, there is still no reliable and comprehensive data on administrative and public services. The information system of the Ministry of the Interior was provided with 10,000 descriptions of the delivery of services, and only 2 percent of said monitoring indicators, describing service quality, price, and other parameters. Collected information was meant to be used not only for management decisions made by the state, but also for providing the public with the conditions for conducting searches in the public catalogue,” said Chief Public Auditor Ingryda Česnakevičiūtė.
In the audit recommendations, the Ministry of the Interior was charged with developing a public service provision mechanism, which would allow for the selection of the most appropriate public service provider, and help specify which administrative and public services should be provided by the state. The Ministry was given until the end of 2019 to complete this task.
This audit is part of the public audit, “Improvement of Public Management”, specified in the public audit programme for 2017 developed by the National Audit Office. In October, the National Audit Office commenced another part of this programme – “Improvement of the Institutional Framework of the Public Sector”.