The report identified "serious and persistent deficiencies" in the department's management of the contracts, including "significant skill and capability gaps" among staff and "persistent shortcomings" in areas ranging from record keeping to the ability to assess value for money.
It identified "serious and persistent deficiencies" in the department's management of the contracts, including "significant skill and capability gaps" among staff and "persistent shortcomings" in areas ranging from record keeping to the ability to assess value for money.
Margaret Hodge, chairwoman of the committee, said that if the market was to work effectively, there "must be relevant and robust information so that students can make informed choices about courses and the Department for Education (DfE) can assess value for money".
Employers "lack the capability or the incentive to assess value for money", it said.
It added: "More specific long-term aims and objectives, along with more information about their benefits and appropriate performance measures, are needed to assess value for money".
The proposed SPLP model is sufficiently general to be independent of the procurement method (competitive tendered or negotiated, for example) and of the treatment of revenue allocation (net or gross based contracts), with the additional advantage of being able to assess value for money for government.
A threshold ICER of three times gross domestic product per capita will be used to assess value for money.
Pressure to assess "value for money" in the use of public sector resources for research funding has risen in recent years [ 2- 9].
Moreover, an absence of guideline on what information should be used in order to assess value for money and a lack of HTA capacity of the TRP secretariat prohibit the use of value for money information in TRP review process.
The cost-effectiveness approach will assess value for money in terms of cost per fall averted, and the cost-utility analysis will assess cost per quality adjusted life year (QALY) gained.
