Updated: Migration Advisory Committee triennial review added.
In April 2011, Cabinet Office announced that all non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs) still in existence following the reforms brought about by the Public Bodies Act would have to undergo a substantive review at least once every 3 years, starting in 2011 to 2012.
These triennial reviews would have 2 purposes:
- to provide a strong challenge of the continuing need for individual NDPBs, both their function and their form, employing the ‘3 tests’ discipline
- where it is agreed that a particular body should remain as an NDPB, to review the control and governance arrangements in place to ensure that the public body is complying with recognised principles of good corporate governance
Guidance on how these reviews should be undertaken was published by Cabinet Office in June 2011.
One of the founding principles of the reviews is transparency. The guidance stipulates that the review itself should be open and transparent, and that a report must be published at the end of the review that details the evidence and rationale for decisions about the body’s future. Departments publish these reports online and announce their publication to Parliament.
Guidance on the triennial review process is part of the wider governance of public bodies.
Triennial reports hosted on external websites
- Youth Justice Board triennial review 2013
- Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) triennial review 2013
- Equality 2025 triennial review 2013
- Probation Trusts triennial review 2013
- Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority (CICA) triennial review 2013
- Capital for Enterprise Ltd, following the creation of the business bank