Last year's announcement that the government was to axe 192 quangos, merge 118 and reform 171 was intended to burn through bureaucracy and save millions in the process.
As the results of this process hit the headlines again, a new report from the Institute for Government suggests that executive agencies have risen from the ashes and are quangos in another guise – or, to quote the report, have been "embraced as the default delivery option in cases where there is a need to deliver public functions within central government but with a degree of operational independence and autonomy from ministers".
Initially set up to plug gaps in civil service delivery and management and to sidestep central rules and regulations through a clearly defined brief and accountable to ministers, these agencies are "enjoying a new lease of life", the authors of the report say but, 20 years on, problems have emerged.
While executive agencies have helped deliver projects, including transfer payments and road building, the relationship between core department that attached agency has lost its way. Too often there is either a disconnect between management and policy, or ministers are unable to delegate properly to agencies.
Kate Jenkins and Jennifer Gold, the authors of the report, argue that more skill and subtlety is needed to manage department-agency relations.
They also argue that agencies have become too inward looking and preoccupied with departmental targets rather than the public. Monopoly pricing for services and passing the cost of operational failure to users are also raised in the report.
It argues that central departments – the Cabinet Office and the Treasury – also need to support rather than direct how agencies work.
Jenkins and Gold recommend that agencies "should not be used for poorly defined, politically sensitive or inadequately planned activities".
"The most important factor is not the structure but the coherent purpose of the organisation," they argue.
They also say there needs to be a clear business case and agencies should be used as vehicles "for better and more focused management".
"Without a constant awareness of users," they add, "bureaucracy can become more important than public service."
The report into executive agencies comes as the Labour party accused the government this week of passing off frontline service cuts as savings from axing the quangos. Figures released by the government under an FOI request showed that less than 10% of savings are directly from breaking up hundreds of public bodies.
The figures revealed that of the £33bn savings the government says will come from the quango reforms, just under £2.6bn came from administrative changes. Most was from direct spending on services and funding allocation by the quangos.
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