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11 April 2000
2000-01 MAIN SUPPLY ESTIMATES
Main Supply Estimates seek funds from Parliament for most Government spending. The Main Estimates for 2000-01 amount to £241.8 billion; they have been presented today to the House of Commons by the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, Stephen Timms MP.
Provision sought in the Estimates for 2000-01 is consistent with plans published in the Financial Statement and Budget Report (HC 346) and the series of departmental reports (Cm 4602 to Cm 4621) now being published and in the Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses 2000-01 (Cm 4601) also published today.
As announced in the Government's Economic and Fiscal Strategy Report 1998, Stability and Investment in the Long Term (Cm 3978) new arrangements for planning and controlling public expenditure were introduced from 1999-2000. The main aggregate for public spending, Total Managed Expenditure (TME), includes Departmental Expenditure Limits (DEL) subject to firm three-year plans which operate as limits on spending at the departmental level covering both voted and non voted provision and main departmental programmes in Annually Managed Expenditure (AME) subject to annual review as part of the Budget process.
Voted expenditure within DEL totals £156.5 billion in 2000-2001. This is 65 per cent of total Supply, a similar proportion to that in the 1999-2000 Main Estimates.
Supplementary Estimates may be presented later in the year. Any increase in TME will be met in the case of DEL by offsetting savings or from the DEL Reserve, so that the overall level of expenditure within DEL is not exceeded. Similarly, AME contains a margin for uncertainty in the forecasting of its components.
Running costs limits covering expenditure on departmental administration in 2000-01 are announced in Cm 4601. Most running costs expenditure is controlled gross, but there are net running costs limits for certain areas where expenditure and receipts vary in line with demand. All departmental running costs are within DEL.
NOTE TO EDITORS
1. Main Supply Estimates presented by the Treasury for 2000-01 are published as a House of Commons paper (HC 377). The 2000-01 Main Estimates for the House of Commons, the National Audit Office and the new Electoral Commission have been presented separately to Parliament today, as HC 374, 375 and 376 respectively. All are available from Stationery Office bookshops.